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THE POETICAL WORKS 


t 
OF I 

1 


, ROBERT BURNS 


POEMS. 




By JOSEPH SKIPSEY. 


^ 

I 


J AMES POTT <& CO., 
14 iS: i6 AsTOR Place. 


1885. 


V r - - ,--.-' 



MS 



48 65 55 

r 

JUL 2 1942 \ 



014Z(QP 



\ 






CONTENTS. 



Prefatory Notice. 



POEMS. 



PAGE 


PAGE 


Adam A 's Prayer 355 


A Prayer, left by the Author 


A Dedication to Gavin 


at a Rev. Friend's House, 


Hamilton 220 


in the Room where he 


A Dream 137 


Slept 208 


Address of Beelzebub to 


A Prayer in the Prospect 


the President of the 


of Death 201 


Highland Society .... 336 


A Prayer under the Pres- 


Address Spoken by Miss 


sure of Violent Anguish 205 


Fontenelle on her Benefit 


A Winter Night 181 


Night 299 




Address to Edinburgh 227 


Castle Gordon 174 


Address to the Deil 121 




Address to the Shade of 


Death and Dr. Hornbook . . 96 


Thomson on Crowning 


Delia 318 


his Bust at Ednara, Rox- 


Despondency : an Ode 193 


burghshire, with Bays . . 269 




Address to the Toothache 278 


Elegy on Capt. Matthew 


Address to the Unco Guid, 


Henderson 248 


or the Rigidly Righteous 160 


Elegy on Peg Nicholson . . 348 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Elegy on Miss Burnet of 

Monboddo 294 

Elegy on the Death of Robt. 

Dundas, Esq 341 

Elegy on the Death of Ro- 
bert Ruisseaux 356 

Elegy on the Death of Sir 

James Hunter Blair 318 

Elegy on the Year 1788. ... 316 
Epitaph on Holy Willie . . 146 

Esopus to Maria 325 

Extempore on Two 
Lawyers 236 

Halloween 166 

Holy Willie's Prayer 142 

Inscription on the Tomb- 
stone erected by Burns 
to the Memory of Fer- 
gusson 175 

Invitation to a Medical 
Gentleman to attend a 
Masonic Meeting 295 

Lament for James, Earl of 
Glencairn 202 

liament occasioned by the 
Unfortunate Issue of a 
Friend's Amour ......... 190 



PAGE 

Lament of Mary Queen of 
Scots on the approach of 
Spring 253 

Lines on Fergusson 292 

Lines on Meeting with Lord 
Daer 296 

Lines sent to Sir J. White- 
f oord, Bart 265 

Lines Written in Friars' 
Carse Hermitage, on the 
Banks of the Nith 157 

Lines Written in Friars' 
Carse Hermitage, on 
Nithside 158 

Lines Written to a Gentle- 
man who had sent him a 
Newspaper, and offered 
to continue it free of 
expense 125 

Lines Written with a Pencil 
over the Chimney-piece 
in the Parlour of the 
Inn at Kenmore, Tay- 
mouth 226 

Lines Written with a Pencil, 
Standing by the Fall of 
Fyers, near Loch Ness . . 281 

Man was Made to Mourn . . 197 



CONTENTS. 



5 



PAGE 

Ode : Sacred to the Memory 

of Mrs. Oswald 255 

Ode to Ruin 210 

On a Wag in Mauchline . . 147 
On the Birth of a Post- 
humous Child 280 

On the Death of a Favour- 
ite Daughter 95 

On the Illness of a Favour- 
ite Child.. 200 

Prologue for Mr. Suther- 
land's Benefit Night, 
Dumfries 314 

Prologue, Spokev at the 
Theatre, Dumfries, on 
New- Year's Day Even- 
ing, 1790 273 

Prologue, Spoken by Mr. 
Woods on his Benefit 
Night 353 

Remorse 348 

Scotch Drink 73 

Sketch : Inscribed to the 

Right Hon. C. J. Fox . . 115 
Stanzas in the Prospect of 

Death 202 



PAGE 

Tarn o' Shanter 44 

Tarn Samson's Elegy 162 

The Auld Farmer's New- 
Year Morning Salutation 
to his Auld Mare Maggie 
on giving her the accus- 
tomed Rip of Corn to 
hansel in the New Year, 176 
The Author's Earnest Cry 
and Prayer to the Scotch 
Representatives in the 

House of Commons 77 

The Brigs of Ayr 103 

The Calf 117 

The Cottar's Saturday 

Night 37 

The Death and Dying 
Words of Poor Mailie ... 127 

The Farewell 328 

The First Psalm 204 

The First Six Verses of the 

Ninetieth Psalm 206 

The Hermit 283 

The Holy Fair 87 

The Humble Petition of 
Bruar Water to the 
Noble Duke of Athol. ... 272 

The Inventory 285 

The Jolly Beggars 69 



CONTENTS, 



PAGE 

The Kirk's Alarm 342 

The Ordination Ill 

The Poet's Welcome to his 

Illegitimate Child 320 

The Rights of Woman .... 298 

The Tarbolton Lasses 84 

The Tarbolton Lasses 85 

The Twa Dogs 51 

The Twa Herds; or, The 

Holy Tulzie 275 

The Vision 147 

The Vowels : a Tale 313 

The Whistle 288 

To a Haggis 218 

To a Kiss 127 

To a Louse, on Seeing one 
on a Lady's Bonnet at 

Church 224 

To a Mountain Daisy 208 

To a Mouse 180 

To a Painter 142 

To a Young Lady in Church 207 
To Captain Riddel of Glen- 
riddel 311 

ToClarinda 118 

ToClarinda 119 

To Clarmda 119 

ToClarinda 120 

To Miss Cruikshank 270 



PAGE 

To Miss Logan, with Beat- 
tie's Poems, as a New 
Year's Gift, January 1, 

1787 212 

To the Owl 351 

Tragic Fragment 352 

Verses Intended to be 
Written belovy a noble 
Earl's Picture 265 

Verses on an Evening View 
of the Ruins of Lincluden 
Abbey 349 

Verses on a Scotch Bard 
gone to the West Indies . 216 

Verses on Captain Grose's 
Peregrinations through 
Scotland, collecting the 
Antiquities of that King- 
dom 266 

Verses on Reading in a 
Newspaper the death of 
John M'Leod, Esq 271 

Verses on seeing a Wounded 
Hare Limp by me which 
a FeUow had just Shot . . 268 

Verses on the destruction of 
the Woods near Drum- 
lanrig 211 



J 



CONTENTS, 


i 
7 


PAGE 


PAGE 1 


Verses to an old Sweetheart 


Verses to my Bed 


195 \ 


after her Marriage 185 


Verse to the Master of the 




Verses to John Maxwell of 


House where Burns had 




Terraughty, on his Birth- 


been Entertained 


239 


day 312 




i 


Verses written under Violent 


Willie Chalmers 


346 


Grief ■ 205 


Winter : a Dirge 

TLES. 


196 I 


EPIS 


Epistle to a Young Friend. 213 


Epistle to the Guidwife 




Epistle to Davie 185 


of Wauchope House 


301 ■; 


Epistle to Dr. Blacklock . . 290 


Epistle to the Rev. John 




Epistle to Gavin Hamilton, 


M'Math 


305 


Esq 308 


Epistle to Wm. Simpson . . 


239 


Epistle to Hugh Parker ... 338 


First Epistle to R. Graham, 


\ 


Epistle to James Smith ... 131 


Esq. of Fintry 


256 


Epistle to James Tait of 


Poetical Invitation to Mr. 




Glenconner 323 


John Kennedy 


340 , 


Epistle to John Goudie, 


Second Epistle to Davie :. . 


281 ; 


Kilmarnock 321 


Second Epistle to Lapraik . 


234 \ 


Epistle to John Lapraik . . 229 


Second Epiytle to Robert 


i 


Epistle to John Rankine . . 245 


Graham, Esq. of Fintry.. 


259 ■ 


Epistle to Major Logan 333 


Third Epistle to J. Lapraik 


303 1 


Epistle to Mr. M'Adam of 


Third Epistle to Robert 


] 


Craigengillan 310 


Graham, Esq. of Fintry. 


329 \ 


■^p 


T^l^^* 





prefatory flotice. 




HE Prince of tiie Poets of the People -^ 
of those who have sprung from the 
ranks, and the rich tones of whose 
lyres have found an echo in the 
popular heart — Robert Bttens, was 
born on 25th January 1759, in an 
'* aula clay biggin," or cottage, about 
two miles south of Ayr. This ** auld 
clay biggin " in which the great poet was born was built 
by his father, who himself was a notable man. " My 
father," wrote the poet, *' v/as of the north of Scotland, 
the son of a farmer, and was thrown by early misfortune 
on the world at large, where, after many wanderings and 
sojournings, he picked up a pretty large quantity of 
observation and experience, to which I am indebted for 
most of my pretensions to wisdom." Having sufficient 
intelligence to know the value of a good education, this 
noble-minded father spared no exertion on his part in 
the education of his children. His means were essentially 
limited ; **but where there's a will there's a way" is a 
maxim, for the truth of which the British, above all 
races, are the most ready to vouch, and though it is far 
from equal to the strain so often put upon it, yet a 
powerful will is able to perform wonders ; and Burns was 
blest with a father who had such a will, and that, too, 
united with a high moral purpose seldom to be met with 
in any grade of society, and the * ' way " somehow was 
found by which his children, to a great extent, obtained 
the education desired. 



When five years old the poet was sent to school, and 
about two years after, upon the removal of the family to 
Mount Oliphant, his father united with other neighbour 
farmers to engage a teacher for their children " at a small 
salary." Reading and writing, and some knowledge of 
arithmetic and English grammar, were by these means 
early acquired, and to these, in after years, Burns was 
enabled to add a knowledge of geometry and mensuration. 
He also added a slight acquaintance of Latin and French, 
and what was of more value still in a poet's education, he 
was by degrees made acquainted with some of the best 
English literature ; while as for the songs and ballads in 
his own Doric, these he had sung into his ears and into 
his heart by the sweet tongue of his own mother, while 
she yet dandled him upon her knee. Talk of a lack of a 
classical education ; but for one who, above all others, 
was ordained to be the people's poet, and more emphati- 
cally still, the poet of the poor, what more could a 
university training have done ? While it is recorded as 
an instance of Burns's aptitude for learning that he 
parsed nouns in his eleventh year, he yet appears to 
have had only a dull ear for music, and to have had 
much difficulty with his music lessons — a matter con- 
ceivable enough when we reflect that even in these early 
years the poet may have been too much engrossed with 
certain mysterious tones in the deeps of his own soul — 
an inner music — to have permitted that culture of the 
ear required for the appreciation of external music. 
Who would care to pay much heed to a squeaking fiddle 
or a droning bagpipe who was already alive to and 
enthralled by the music of the spheres ? The clever 
young teacher of Burns — one Murdoch — never dreamed 
of this state of things, and his large dark -eyed 
pupil in consequence **had a dull ear." So had hia 



PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE. 1 1 



brother Gilbert ; but this Gilbert * ' had the liveliest 
imagination and the readiest wit," and had the teacher 
been asked at that time which of the brothers was the 
most likely to become a poet, he would assuredly have 
answered Gilbert. Of course Murdoch was a teacher, 
but no poet nor prophet. ** Robert's countenance," said 
he, **was generally grave and expressive of a serious 
contemplative mind. Gilbert's face said. Mirth, with, 
thee I mean to live." And yet of the two, the latter 
was the most likely to become a poet ! Yet this teacher 
was a man of intelligence, but so little is the poetic 
temperament understood, and so little does the world 
know of the stuff of which poets are made, that they are 
regarded as simpletons and day-dreamers, and unfitted 
for actual life, or unfit to live, for that matter, or as a 
sort of rhyming merry-andrews — people who have an 
aptitude for discharging in verse their ever ready-charged 
repartee rifles on every occasion, instead of being what 
the best of them are, beings who see most deeply into, 
and are, in consequence, able to take the clearest and 
sanest view of men and things. That they do not always 
conform themselves to the usages of society is altogether 
a different thing, and may arise out of causes which are 
less a discredit to themselves than to the world at large. 

" The poet in a golden clime was born, 
With golden stars above ; 
Dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn, 
The love of love." 

'*With the hate of hate and the scorn of scorn" of 
all that is hollow, and mean, and sordid, and base, of 
course; and '*with the love of love" of all that is 
noble, and pure, and sweet, and comely to look upon. 
And should a harum-scarum bard, such as Burns is 
sometimes thought to have been, happen to meet in his 



life's journey with more of the former — the sordid and 
base, — til an of the latter — the sweet and comely, — what 
marvel if from his deep-toned lyre there should at times 
proceed a song, not merely formed of such phrases as 
** gentle zephyrs " and '* purling rills," and which would 
fall upon the worldling's ears not altogether " like music 
on the waters *' — but a song pregnant with the scorn of 
scorn, and one calculated to strike the heart of the 
wrong-doer to the centre, or take the heartless hypocrite 
with affected horror. The only matter for marvel is 
that we have not a greater number of such songs ; rather 
this would be a marvel did we not know the penalty 
which some of the world's great poets have had to pay 
for having dared to speak the truth, and so put 
its idolised devils for the moment to shame. And that 
Scotland's great poet was one of these martyrs, who that 
is at all acquainted with the facts of his life can deny ? 
** Poor Burns — it is a great pity he did not act more 
wisely.'* In so far as the remark applies to his having 
lashed selfishness, high-handed oppression, and duplicity, 
I say — for suffering humanity at least — it would have 
been a thousand pities if he had done otherwise. Burns 
yet erred like other men as a man, and for that the more 
was the pity ; but of this in due time. It is for us a 
plcasanter duty just now to refer to the stage of his life 
when he is first known to have broken into song. 

This occurred in his sixteenth year, and his first song, 
'* Handsome Nell," was written in celebration of **a 
sweet, sonsie lass," who had been a co-labourer with him 
in the harvest fields. This girl, he wrote to Dr. Moore, 
the father of the celebrated general. Sir John Moore, had 
initiated him in the passion of love, ** which, in spite of 
its acid disappointment, gin-horse prudence, and book- 
worm philosophy, I hold to be the first of human joys, 



PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE, 1 3 



our dearest blessing here below ! How she caught tho 
contagion I cannot tell ; but I never expressly said I 
loved her. Indeed, I did not know myself why I liked 
so much to loiter behind with her, when returning in 
the evening from our labours ; why the tones of her 
voice made my heart-strings thrill like an ^olian harp ; 
and particularly why my pulse beat such a furious ratan 
when I fingered over her little hand to pick out the cruel 
stings and thistles. Among her other love-inspiring 
qualities she sang sweetly, and it was to her favourite reel 
that I strove to give an embodied vehicle in rhyme." 
This account of the origin of our bard's first song is 
alone enough to consecrate and endear it to all lovers of 
song ; but the song itself possesses at least one stanza of 
I intrinsic value — 



i 



" She dresses aye sae clean and neat, 
Both modest and genteel ; 
And then there's something in her gait 
Gars ony dress look weel" — 

a stanza which might have been produced by our poet in 
his more mature period. Burns himself, in speaking of 
the effort as a whole, said, *' It is very puerile and sill}^, 
but I am always pleased with it, as it recalls to my mind 
those happy days when my heart was yet honest, and my 
tongue was sincere." 

The *' happy days" of this period ought rather to have 
been called ''happy moments," since ** ruthless ruin" 
had his father in its grip ; and Burns himself, though so 
young, had early and late to ** work like a galley slave " 
to help the family in their sore need. The Olipliant 
speculation had proved a failure, and the lease had not 
yet expired ; and, through early hardship, the noble- 
minded father had grown prematurely old, and was unfit 
for labour. *'We lived very poorly," wrote the poet. 



14 PREFA TOR V NOTICE, 



'* I was a dexterous ploughman, and the next eldest to 
me was my brother (Gilbert), who could drive the plough 
very well, and help to thrash the corn. A novel-writer 
might, perhaps, have viewed these sceues with some 
satisfaction, but so did not I ; my indignation yet boils 
at the recollection of the scoimdrel factor's threatening 
letters which used to set us all in tears." And the 
reader who can read these words without also being set 
in tears may at wice close the book, for he may rest 
assured that there is ** something wrong about his 
heart," and whatever other ability he may have, he lacks 
the requisite feeling to be able to value aright the 
sweetest and best of Burns's precious poetry. Further, 
he may rest assured that there is something wrong about 
his head also, if, besides the tears, he does not feel the 
burning indignation which Burns felt at the hideous 
wrongdoers who could thus cause a noble family to suffer, 
and who have for generations thus caused hundreds of 
families, equally as noble and brave, to thus suffer ; and 
for what purpose but to gratify a cormorant desire for 
wealth, and only that the possessors of such may be in 
a position to lord it over their fellows ? 

"It's hardly in a body's pow'r, 
To keep, at times, frae oeing sour. 
To see how things are shar'd"— 

but it's not **in a body's power" not to feel at 
times as if possessed with a fury when we reflect 

" How best o' chiels are whiles in want, 
While coofs on countless thousands rant, 
And ken na how to wair't "— 

and the more especially when we know at what cost 
such ** thousands " have been procured. To the nature 



of that cost our poet, in his boyhood at Mount 
Oliphant, was rendered too keenly alive ever to forget 
it, and the whole thing was too vivid in his mind not 
to be embodied in song when he felt the power and had 
the opportunity to do so — as many of his poems, and 
more especially his inimitable ** Twa Dogs," will show. 
Of course, as these poems will also testify, however 
keenly he was made to feel such evils, his spirit was too 
powerful and too volatile to be readily crushed by them. 
Then if *'the hate'* and *' the scorn," of which 
Tennyson sings, were his, so was "the love," and 
most emphatically '* the love of love ; " and one can 
willingly believe that no sooner had the burning rags 
of the factor's letters been ** puft up the chimla " by "a 
blast of the norlan' wind," than Burns might have been 
found at the gable-end, or in the stack-yard, pouring 
out other feelings than those of hate and scorn into the 
attentive ears of some handsome Nell. Even then he 
had the feeling, if he had not yet the voice, to sing — 

*• Gie me a canny hour at e'en, 
My arms about my dearie, O, 
An* warly cares, an' warly men, 
May a' gae tapsalteerie, O 1 "— 

and these feelings soon after deepened into passions 
which too often led him into errors, and errors which 
brought unhappiness to the poet^ and finally ruin in 
their train. 

The passions and the errors here referred to, however, 
were not so much felt or committed until some time after 
the family's removal to Lochlea, an event which occurred 
in 1777. The condition of the family appears to have 
been somewhat improved by this removal, and the change 
had a corresponding effect on the bard's spirits and 
genius. The " flood-gates" of his inspiration were more 



widely opened, and song after song were poured forth, i 
many of wliicli are truly beautiful. As Lockhart has 
observed, **they show how powerfully his boyish ^ 
fancy had been affected by the old minstrelsy of his \ 
country, and how easily his native taste caught the * 
secret of its charm. The truth and simplicity of nature 
breathed in every line — the images are always just, often 
t originally happy — and the growing refinement of his ear 
J and judgment may be traced in the terser language and . 
f more mellow flow of each successive ballad. " ** Tibbie, \ 
\ I hae seen the day," *'0n Cessnock Banks," "My \ 
\ father was a farmer," and others, were of this period ; \ 
\ and before he had reached his twenty-fourth year, " The | 
\ Corn Rigs," **Mary Morison," '*My Nannie, 0," and 
I others of his best songs were produced. 

In his seventeenth year, much against his father's 
will, to give his ''manners a brush," he had attended a 
dancing school ; in his nineteenth year, to learn dialling, 
he had gone and spent some time at Kirkoswald, and in 
his twenty-first year he had, to learn the wool-combing 
trade, gone to Irvine, and through these and other 
means had had his observations on men and manners, 
and his knowledge of human nature and the actual 
world, extended. This increase of knowledge, however, 
was not to be had without a fee similar to what Eve had 
to pay for a taste of the forbidden fruit. Nor can I see 
how any real knowledge of human nature is to be had at 
a less cost. The market price of this article in this 
nineteenth century, with its hundreds of millions of men 
anl women, just stands at about the same figure as it 
did to our two first naked progenitors in the Garden of 
•: Eden. ** Knowledge," said Byron, ** is sorrow," just as 
\ Bacon had as wisely said, ''Knowledge is power," and 
J they — it is no use blinking the fact — who have not the 



PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE. 1 7 



knowledge, which can only be had with the sorrow or 
suffering, may make excellent tutors to infants, but will 
never have the ** power" to take a position among the 
poets whose songs live in the hearts of a pHoj)Ie. ** Aye, 
but look at Wordsworth, vhat a puie life he led, and 
what noble poems he wrote." He did, and for these let 
us — "the select few" — be thankful; but are these the 
songs of a people's poet ? The mighty genius of Milton 
can hardly be said to have produced sucn, and from the 
same cause. He was too puiitanic, and though his 
sublime conceptions enthrall the imagination, they never 
reach the heart. Not so the best of the products of 
Chaucer and Shakespeare. They **give a very echo to 
the seat where love is throned," and the *' power" by 
which they were enabled to give those inimitable 
portraitures of human life and character was — can there 
be a doubt of it ? — in a great measure obtained through 
their having sinned and suffered for their sins — through 
a bitter experience — through their having committed 
errors as great as any that can be laid to the charge of 
Burns while he stayed at Irvine aad Kirkoswald. 
Without his Irvine and Kirkoswald experiences Burns 
might have been a happier if not a better man, but 
would he have been a wiser poet? Then, let his 
life have been ever so pure, had he not been a fine 
poet, what would we at this day have cared for Robert 
Burns ? 

But there is another standpoint besides that of the 
Puritan's from which the case may be viewed. Our bard 
at the above-named places associated with smugglers 
and other lozels. True. But he was a poor man, and, 
as Principal Shairp observes, had not the choosing 
of his compr.ny. Then, again, he was ** dowered with 
the love of love ;" and let the shortcomings of his 



1 8 PRE FA TOR V NO TICE. 



associates have been ever so many, would the boundless 
sympathy which enabled him to perceive in the field- 
mouse which he turned up with the plough, a ** fellow 
mortal," not enable him to perceive in the direst ruins 
of humanity a something that would touch his heart or 
elicit his regards ? What was it that led the Nazarene 
to die on the Cross ? What but the same ** love of love " 
which led Burns to commit many of the errors of which 
he is accused ? To the same high source may thus 
be traced much of that which is regrettable as well as 
much of that which is commendable in the life of our 
bard. Love for all helpless things that breathed and 
moved — this was his dominating genius — and more espe- 
cially for mankind, for men as men and women as 
women, and not for any particular possessions or attrac- 
tions they had, either inward or outward, beyond what 
he believed to be an unselfish heart. Let people have 
had, or appear to have had, that, or have a[)peared weak 
and down-trodden, and they had an unfailing passport 
to a grasp of his horny fist, and a share in his best feel- 
ings. Hence his apparent predilections for the company 
of " low people" — of men with a brand on their charac- 
ters — and of the society of women who would have been 
bad models for Shakespeare's Perditas and Titanias, or 
for Milton's and Ben Jonson's Mother Eves and Orianas 
— of women who were far from being, according to his 
brother Gilbert, as beautiful always as he thought they 
were, nor, let me add, as virtuous ; and this fact ought 
to weigh a ** wee" on his behalf when we speak of tlie 
scrapes he sometimes got into with the fair sex. Some 
of the objects of his tenderest regards were, however, in 
every way worthy of them ; and such an one was Peggy 
Thomson, whom he had met at Kirkoswald. This 
young woman, who had set his heart on fire and put an 



PRE FA TOR Y NO TICE, 1 9 



end to his mathematical studies, and whom he described 
as having first seen in a garden, "like Proscrjdne, 
gathering flowers, herself a fairer flower" — though it 
has been said she was only in a kail-yard cutting a 
cabbage — was found to be already engaged, and could 
only meet his advances with a promise of friendship. 
It nevertheless cost him some heart-aches to get rid of 
the aftair ; and this was not efl^ected before she had 
become the subject of several fine lyrics, for his 
''passions, when once lighted up, raged like so many 
devils till they got vent in rhyme ; and then the 
conning over the verses, like a spell, soothed all into 
quiet." 

The object of his next attachment appears to have 
been one Agnes Fleming, a se vant, at the time, of his 
friend Gavin Hamilton ; and the fruit of this passion 
was **0'er the hills to Nannie, 0!" — one of the best 
songs in the language. It is pleasant to think that the 
poet's father lived to see and appreciate this fine pro- 
duct of his son's genius, and it was the last of the bard's 
finest pieces he was destined to read. He died soon 
after, and with the painful impression that a sad end 
awaited his glorious first-born. 

By this time Burns and his brother Gilbert had 
removed the family to the farm of Mossgiel, about three 
miles from Lochlea, in the parish of Mauchline, in 
1784. The poet's father had long been incapacitated, 
by early hardsliip, from doing hard work, and th(^ respon- 
sibility of maintaining the household had devolved upon 
the two sons, and chiefly on the poet — he being the 
eldest — and upon this new undertaking he entered with 
the evident determination, if possible, to prove successful. 
He read books on farming, calculated crops, attended 
markets ; but in spite of his combined will and industry, 



20 PRE FA TOR V NO TICE. 



and the utmost economy, his wisdom was ** overset " by 

the same adverse fate wliich had alonsj attended this 
unhappy family. Yet, if deserted by Fortune, he was 
still the darlin<( of the Muses, and during his first two 
years at Mosscriel he composed — besides **The Twa 
Herds," " The Holy Fair," and ** Holy Willie's Prayer " 
—the addresses to ** The Mouse," **The Daisy," **The 
Auld Farmer's Mare, Magi^ie," and **The Cottar's 
Saturday Night," and, indeed, nearly all those fine 
poems which were soon after to cause him to be ranked 
among the best poets of Great Britain. Many of these 
are so precious that, once read, they are ever after 
"f, remembered with joy. The inimitable humour and 
^ drollery of some of them, and the sweetness and pathos 
of others, excite our laughter or tears, kindle our fancy 
and imagination, or touch our deepest and sweetest 
feelings in a way that has been seldom equalled by the 
products of others, and even of our veiy greatest poets. 

We cannot go into the Jean Armour case in detail 
in this note. Yet a few words must be said about this 
j unpleasant affair. Burns, through his intercourse, had 
I brought a stigma upon her family, and her father was 
'. indignant in consequence, and gave vent to his indigna- 
l tion in a manner that has in return excited the indigna- 
I tion of the poet's biographers. The case undoubtedly 
I was a lamentable one. Yet with all my love and 
f admiration for Burns I cannot conceive how the father, 
? under the circumstances, could have acted much otherwise 
I from what he did. That Armour should have shut his 

I door asjainst Burns, and have forbidden his daughter to 
have any further intercourse with him on pain of banish- 
ment, may sound in our ears harsh enough ; but the poet 
in this father's eyes had brought a stain upon his family 
i which no irregular marriage, and indeed any marriage in 



PRE FA TOR V NO TICE. 2 1 



his mind conld wipe out. He was a Puritan, and lived 
and breathed in the very heart of Puritanism, and the 
finorer of warning or of scorn could, by the godly or un- 
godly, be pointed to his door, and this for hiui to bear 
\ was worse than death. Then we must bear in mind that 
\ though Burns had written nearly all his great poems at this 
I time, he yet had only a local reputation, or rather a 
J notoriety as a loose scapegrace of a rhymer, and was not 
I to the good folk of Mauchline, and could not be, the 
\ glorious poet of the people he is to us. His world-wide 
i fame had yet to come, while in the meantime the direful 
I effects of his follies — (which were crimes in Armour's eyes) 
I — were living realities, and realities from which he knew 
\ not how to escape. At length, after a painful considera- 
tion of the matter, our bard resolved to go to the West 
Indies. 
\ Before doing so, however, partly to obtain money, 

; which he needed, and partly through a desire to have 

• his merits known, he made up his mind to publish his 
; poems. ** I thought they had merit," he wrote, **and 
I It was a delicious idea that I should be called a clever 
\ fellow, even thousrh it should never reach my ears 

• — a poor negro driver — or perhaps a victim to that 
inhospitable clime, and gone to the land of spirits.'* "A 

' victim " to some more cruel end than even that which 
[ awaited him in his own land one can quite conceive 
[ might have been written for him in the book of destiny; 

but to think of the man who had penned the immortal 
I "Address to a Mouse" being a slave-driver! Who in 
t their imagination can realise that ? To say the least of 
[ it, he would have made a rare slave-driver, and the 
! ** blacks " would have had a fine time of it, only — alas ! 
\ for the ** niggers" — the ** dream" would have been too 

bright to last. Ah, Burns ! we have only to think of the 



22 PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE. 



greatness of liis heavt, and *'a' his fauts and follies" are 
at once forgotten. But this the mass of purveyors for the 
public taste will not do. They are ** saeguid theirsels," 
that they feel a keener interest in a man's failings than 
they do in his nobler qualities, and on this account the 
errors of a Burns or a Shelley must be hunted up and 
enlarged upon as if these could afford a more delicious 
dish for their hungry readers than the precious poetic 
legacies they have bequeathed to the world, or, wliat is 
as likely, as if they did not endure in a tenfold manner 
in the pangs of "regret, remorse, and shame" any 
possible retribution supposed to be due to their errors, 
and that almost at the very moment of their commission. 
For that they did so there is abundant proof. And this 
can especially be said of Burns in the case which now 
caused him to prepare for Jamaica. If we may accept 
his own statement, never did man love woman as he did 
the one he had wronged, and though, as he imagined, 
she had not been all he could have wished her to be 
towards himself, ** I can," he exclaimed, "have no nearer 
idea of the place of eternal punishment than what I 
have felt in my breast on her account." He also ex- 
pressed his grief in " A Lament," and in his song "The 
Glooniy Night is Gathering Fast," wherein he bids 
"farewell to the bonnie banks of Ayr," from which he 
fancied he was about to depart, never more to return. 
But happily there was a silver lining to the cloud which 
hung over his head at this moment, though he could not 
see it from his tears. 

The publication of his poems, which at last was 
effected, turned out to be all that. They were issued 
from the Kilmarnock press, July 1786, and their success 
was complete. The}'^ established at once and for ever liis 
claim to the title ot Scotland's greatest IsTational Poet. 



PRE FA TOR V NO TICE. 23 



" It is hardly possible to express," wrote Heron, '* wita 
what eager admiration and delight they were everywhere 
received. They eminently possessed all those qualities 
which can contribute to render any work quickly and 
permanently popular. They were written in a phrase- 
ology of which all the powers were universally felt ; and 
which being at once antique and familiar, and now rarely 
written, was hence fitted to serve all the dignified and 
picturesque uses of poetry, without making it unintel- 
ligible — the imagery, the sentiments, were at once 
faithfully natural and irresistibly impressive and inter- 
esting. Those topics of satire and scandal in which the 
rustic delights ; tlie humorous delineation of character, 
and that witty association of ideas, familiar and striking, 
yet not naturally allied to one another, which has force 
to shake his side with laughter ; those fancies of super- 
stition at which he still wonders and trembles ; those 
affecting sentiments and images of true religion which 
are at once dear and awful to the heart, were represented 
by Burns with all a poet's magic power. Old and young, 
high and low, grave and gay, all were alike delighted, 
agitated, transported." Thus wrote Heron, who was 
himself a witness of the effects produced by the issue of 
Burns*s poems. 

The edition was quickly sold out, and in ISTovember 
the same j^ear, instead of going to Jamaica, he went to 
Edinburgh to publish another edition by subscription. 
His fame had gone before him, and a reception awaited 
him on his arrival such as had never been accorded to a 
poet on his first becoming known — at least, not in Great 
Britain. Nearly everybody, from the highest to the 
lowest in the social scale, were anxious to get a blink of 
"the wonderful Ayrshire ploughman." Besides being 
the glory and idol of the masses, he was fded in the 



24 PREFA TOR Y NO TICK. 



\ circles of rank and fashion, and entertained by the most 
I famous philosophers and men of letters which the 
i Scottish capital then boasted. To Professor Stewart in 
I the first place, and, through him, to Mackenzie — the 
I Man of Feeling — who reviewed his poems in No. 97 
\ of the Lounger, the bard was indebted for his introduc- 
\ tion to the upper circles and the Edinburgh public. 

i Among people of distinction to whom he was intro- 
duced besides the Man of Feeling (Dugald Stewart was 

I an old friend) were Drs. Gregory and Blair, Frazer Tytler, 
Loni Monboddo, and the Earl of Glencairn. In the 
society of such cultured minds ** Burns was," Lockhart 
said, "exactly where he was entitled to be." He 
was, in verity, worthy of such, though how many of 
those luminaries thought the same, at this distance of 

; time it would be hard to say. The stalwart rustic bard, 
with his horny fists, his swarthy complexion, and his 
large brilliant dark eyes, had flashed in among them ; 
and by his demeanour, his culture, his originality, and 
wonderful eloquence, had completely taken them by 
surprise; but when the proverbial **nine days* talk" 

; had passed, what then ? In all probability the majority 

I of those who had been drawn out of their customary 
orbits by the sudden appearance of this new planet in 
the literary heavens would have shrunk back into their 
old courses or haldts of thought, and under the sway of 
aristocratic or academic prejudices would be prompted to 

> call into question the value of the impressions that had 
been produced by the uncommon phenomenon. "Men 
are jealous," says Hazlitt, ** and uneasy at sudden and 
upstart popularity, wliich wants the seal of time to j 
confirm it, and what after all may turn out to be false | 
and hollow ; " and was this not a case ia point ? In j 
this frame of mind — which envy most readily and 



PREFA TOR V NO TICK. 25 



without fee lends jealousy a helping hand to produce — 
many would have an open ear for any tale that would 
tend to lower their erewhile feted idol somewhat in 
their esteem ; for we can easier brook the idea of having 
committed an error for once in judgment — since all men 
are liable to err — than we can submit to the idea of 
having our brightest and best qualities eclipsed by the 
splendour of those of another ; and while in this frame 
of mind, such tales one can quite conceive may have 
reached the ears of many of his noble patrons. Rumour, 
** horsed on the viewless couriers of the air," may have 
told ere long of the irregularities of our bard's previous 
life, or of the fact that even while in Edinburgh he had 
other haunts than the resorts of rank and fashion, and 
other associates besides those of the learned and the high- 
born, and whose society he prized as much as he did 
theirs ; and all this might form reason sufficient that 
they should at least have less anxiety as to the future 
weal of their sometime " honoured guest " than their 
attentions at first may have led him to expect. Be this 
as it may, no sooner had Burns turned his back on the 
Scottish capital than he seemed to be all but forgotten, 
and when he returned, as he did, to the city in the 
ensuing winter, he met with the cold shoulder from many 
of his former distinguished entertainers. 

During his absence, he of course had hurried home, 
and having made glad the hearts of his dear old mother 
and her family by an account of his late splendid 
triumphs, he made a tour to the Highlands, and the 
Scottish and English Borders. Though these tours were, 
according to Principal Shairp, unproductive of any 
apparent valuable poetic work, yet through them he got 
a knowledge of localities, and traditions, and so on, that 
proved of service to him when he began to write his 



26 PRE FA TOR V NO TICE, 



songs for the Museum of Johnson, whom he met on liis 
iirst visit to the capitah His rambles over, he returned 
there in October with the object of eifecting a settlement 
with Creech, the publisher of his po2ms ; but tliis was 
not accomplished till the succeeding March, and during 
the interim he is said to have spent much of his time in 
not the most select society. My own belief is that he 
spent such time in the best company he could command, 
and if the people with whom he mixed made too free at 
times with strong drink, they only did what nearly 
everybody eLc wiio had the means at that period was 
accustomed to do — not only in Scotland but ia tlie 
whole of the British Isles. That matters in this respect 
are much improved at present is the natural outcome of 
the march of events, and is not so much a credit 
as it would have been a shame to us if they had not, 
seeing that the mass of people have otlier accommodation 
for social intercourse than that wliich a century ago 
could only be afforded by the beer and whisky shops. Then 
Burns, whatever could be said of some of the ** ranting, 
roving blades " v/ith whom he at times associated, could 
not, at that period at least, be with fairness called the 
*' drunken Burns" I have lately seen him called in a 
London periodical, though he, if occasion required, 
could take liis glass, and had otherwise his failings, as 
we have already seen. Drunken he was not, and the 
other failings may all be summed up in, or resulted from, 
an indomitable passion for the fair sex. Had lie been 
the former, he could not have conducted the great cor- 
respondence he up to the time of his death did, and at 
the same time have performed his social duties ; and 
without his passion for women, he could not have left 
the many beautiful songs he has left for our enjoyment. 
This uniiappy passion, however, seems to have grown 



PRE FA TOR V NO TICK. 27 



more and more uncontrollable after his first visit to 
Edinburgh, and during his second visit nearly to have 
led him into entanglements, from which he would liave 
found it still more difficult to have escaped than from 
any in which he had been involved in the da^s of his 
obscurity. Tliis was with a Mrs. M 'Lehose— liie 
Clarinda of his letters — a lady who had been deserted 
by her husband through incompatibility of temper. 
Though Clarinda had been married ten years, and had 
liad four children, two of whom only were then living, 
she was yet young when Burns met with her — two years 
younger than himself; and she was beautiful — was 
possessed of cultured tastes — had some poetic ability — 
had a fascinating manner — and was altogether a being 
calculated to take captive the affections of the poet. 
And from many expressions in his letters to her, one 
would imagine that she had done so, and completely. 
She was to him, in the letters, "the first of women," 
and "dear as the light that visits those sad eyes," 
** dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart," and he 
vows to love her "to death, through death, and for ever," 
all which words, with the rest of the letters in Avliich 
they were contained, and some songs the bard had 
addressed to her, were treasured up in Clariuda's memory 
till her dying day ; and she lived to be an old woman. 
Burns undoubtedly hnd allowed himself to be drawn 
into an unhappy position by this fair sinner. Yet one 
cannot but rejoice that at the very moment he appeared 
the most a slave to the charms of Clarinda, he had 
become reconciled to one who had a more legitimate 
claim upon his regards — even his *' bonny Jean ; " and 
to this woman he was married in due form shortly after 
his return to Ayrshire in March 1788. 

He now took the farm of Ellisland, on the western 



28 PRE FA TOR Y NO TICK. 



bank of the Nith, six miles above Dumfries, on wliich 
he entered at Whitsuntide. On his first entering upon 
the farm he occupied a small smoky cottage, in which he 
was the ** solitary inmate" — his wife and child being 
left at Mauchline — till December. He then took lod-zings 
for them and himself at a neighbouring faim, where 
they remained till the finishin<f of a new homestead, 
which was now being built at Ellisland, and to which 
they could not be removed before the middle of 
the ensuing year. During the months preceding his 
wife's arrival, the poet's reflections on his position, on 
the responsibilities he had latel}^ incurred, and how he 
was to acquit himself with credit in his new sphere of 
action, had repeatedly thrown him into a state of 
despondency. The apparent lack of sympathy, too, 
which he at first met with in the Ellisland locality 
helped to turn his gloorniness into querulousness, and 
led him to entertain the most disrespectful notions of 
his new neighbours. " The only things in this country," 
he wrote, '* to be found- in perfection are stupidity and 
canting." But he was soon undeceived in this matter ; 
he soon found, as Principal Shairp observes, that "there 
was enough of sociality among all ranks of Dumfries 
people, from the laird to the cottar — indeed, more than 
was good for himself ; " and on the opening of the New 
Year, with his wife by his side, he found himself in 
better spirits. 

Later on in the same year, 1789, he procured a 
place in the Excise, the application for, and the 
acceptance of which, appears to have cost him some 
misgiving. To ordinary men in ordinary circum- 
stances the post of an exciseman would be held a 
post of honour ; but need one ask if Burns was an 
ordinary man ? or need one ask if his position in rela- 



tion to the Excise was of an ordinary character ! He 
was a splendid poet, and had in a supreme degree the 
sensitive orc^anism peculiar to the children of the Muses — 
a being possessed of a capacity for the noblest thought, 
yet one who, having sprung from the masses, shared 
with them their prejudices as well as prepossessions ; and 
a stronsj antipathy to the Excise, like that in our day to 
the police, was among them. Then, as a satirist he 
had not hesitated to lash the failings of others, for he 
had **the hate of hate and the scorn of scorn" as well 
as " the love of love ; " and though he is not known 
up to this time to have used his weapon against the 
Excise, he is known to have been on terms of intimacy 
with men who were addicted to a traffic which it was the 
boundcn duty of the Excise to put down. This being so, 
could he with feelings of honour seek or accept the office 
in question ? or even if he could satisfy his conscience on 
this head, what would his late Irvine and Kirkoswald 
friends say ? Would the erewhile ideal or idol of these 
people not be regarded as a turncoat on former pro- 
fessions, and be himself deemed in turn worthy of the 
lash he had so often and so freely used upon others ? 
Reflections like these in all likelihood at the time occur- 
red to torture the "ill-starred" bard, for he had "seen 
the day when his auditory nerves would have felt very 
delicately on this subject, but" — but, what was he to 
do ? From his previous experience in farming, he could 
not possibly have had high hopes of success in his 
Ellisland speculation ; and should he fail — and there 
had been so many failures in these matters in the 
family — what would be the result ? What had Fortune 
allotted to his father when he had failed ? The eaily 
experience of our bard was such, that when he became 
the least straitened in his means, and so was made to 



30 PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE. 



coasider his actual position and his prospects, he lost 
all his glowing euthusiasin, was bereft of hope, hung 
his harp upon the willows, and sunk into despair 
before the shadows of a jail, or starvation. To people 
wlio have been dandled in the lap of Fortune, these 
things have only a vague significance compared to what 
they have for those who have been actually on the 
brink of the one, or have for years lived in the dread of 
being actually thrust into the other ; and to the sensi- 
tive poet they were not only realities, but the sternness 
of these realities was intensified when he considered that 
beside himself he had by this time others to care and 
cater for, and others whose helplessness he was bound 
by the strongest ties of humanity to protect. Vanity, 
whose voice is often mistaken for honest pride, or for 
conscience, might upbraid him for a lack of consistency, 
and remind him of the probability of his honesty being 
called into question by his confreres of other days ; but 
the thought of a wife's despair, or of the cry of little ones 
for bread he might not have to give them — surely these 
ought to render him deaf to the one, and reckless as to 
what might be said over their smuggled whisky by the 
others. Moreover, in spite of his own or of others' pre- 
judices, it must alwa3's have been clear enough to our 
bard that there was another side to the picture of a 
ganger beside that of the po}>ular one, and if his daring 
and hardihood at one time in his young eyes may have 
given the contraband trader somewhat the air of a hero, 
was there not also a smack of the heroic in men who, in 
pursuit of conscientious duties, dared to confront tlie 
prejudices of the masses, and to beard the armed smug- 
gler in his den ? In the light of these considerations, 
Burns, again out of two evils, I imagine, was wisely led to 
choose the lesser — " on reason firm to build resolve" — 



PRE FA TOR V NO TICK. 3 1 



to apply for and accept the officership in question — 
which, bad as it was, was after all to him a godsend. 
"£50 a-year, and a provision for wife and orphans," 
he fancied was *'no bad settlement for a poet." At 
any rate it was sufficient to relieve him from anxiety 
as to the future, and to leave his mind more at liberty for 
devotion to the Muse. 

Literature and his excise duties now began to absorb 
the most of his time and attention, and his interest in 
the farm gradually declined, till after the lapse of about 
two years, when his excise salary having been increased 
to £70 a-year, the farm was abandoned altogether. His 
stock was sold, and he removed to Dumfries, where he 
spent the remainder of his days between the performance 
of his official work and the writing of songs for the 
collections of Johnson and Thomson, and in visits to 
— or in the reception of visits from — distinguished neigh- 
bours and strangers. During his residence at Ellisland, 
besides his noble ** Address to Mary in Heaven," he 
wrote several fine lyrics for the ^coW Musical Museum, 
but he produced no poem of equal value to those which 
had already sent his name through the length and 
breadth of the land, except **Tam o' Shanter; " nor did 
he produce anythin^^ of equal value afterwards. He had 
been urged by learned friends to try and write some 
work on a larger scale than anything he has left us, and 
he even contemplated the })roduction of a drama, but 
happily never seriously tried to carry such a project into 
execution. I say happily, since it would have been a 
rare drama indeed that could have added anything to 
his fame, while a failure w^ould have acted as a clog to 
it. A supreme regular drama, his best critics have 
thought, was not to be expected from our poet ; but some 
of them think that he mi^ht have given us a series 



32 PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE. 



of poems similar to "Tarn o' Shanter." I think 
this supposition almost implies as much lack of 
consideration as the supposition that he could have 
produced a drama at all worthy to be ranked with his 
poems. The thing was just possible, but was it probable ? 
If genuine poems could be composed at any moment by 
a mere effort of the poet's will-power, just as a mathe- 
matical problem may almost at any time be solved by an 
expert mathematician, we might have reasonably con- 
cluded that a series of other ** Tarn o' Shanters " might 
have succeeded the one he did produce. *' But no man 
can say *I will write a poem,'" says Shelley, and much 
less could even the greatest poet that ever breathed 
assert with confidence that he would write a series of 
*• Tam o' Shanters." That verse by the mile can be spun 
out at will by any clever scribbler, a visit to our fashion- 
able book marts in the months of October and N^ovember 
will testify ; but if we have any doubts as to the utter 
unworthiness of such, a visit to the second-hand book 
stalls in the succeeding February and March will correct 
our misgivings at once. No poet ever did, or ever can, 
produce many masterpieces — or at least of the kind 
which prove a source of delight at once to the highest 
and the lowest in the social scale — to the cultured and 
uncultured. The rarity of appearance of such poems, 
whether as drama, or song, or bailad — and the best of 
epics is only a series of ballads — is assuredly notable, 
and wiien they do come, they form a sort of advent in 
verse literature ; and so precious are they, that a few of 
them will not only immortalise the poet, but add to the 
glory of the nation that has produced them. How such 
poems come into existence is a question on which at all 
times the **doctors" have **disagreed," and so upon this 
question we shall not linger here ; but whether they are 



PRE FA TOR V NO TICE. 33 



the products of observation and reflection only, or whether 
they are dropped from the stars, in the most divine 
perfection, into the poet's soul while he sleeps, and from 
thence in some lucky hour are again ordained to issue 
with their stellar lustre, somewhat dimmed indeed, yet 
rendered even more charming to mortal eyes by the 
variety of colour — the result of feeling and passion — they 
acquire from the channel through which they must pass ; 
or whether they have their origin in ideas which are 
in the poet's soul when he is born, and wherein 
they may have lain ever since God first said, **Let there 
be Light, and there was Light " — and wherein they might 
still have to lie, were they not driven therefrom by the 
irresistible force of some accident or what j'ou will (even 
as sparkles of fire are forced from the flint by a blow of a 
steel-faced hammer), and so were compelled to bless 
the world by their radiant beauty — whether the famous 
poems in question have their origin in any of these 
ways, or in some other ; of one thing we may rest assured, 
and that is, when they are written they are produced 
upon compulsion. To no mere fancy nor desire to cut a 
figure in literature are we indebted for such poems, though 
such fancies and desires may naturally follow in their 
wake : and much less are they to be had for the asking. 
Through the request of a Captain Grose, indeed, the 
rhyming mill of a Burns may be set in motion, the 
outcome of which shall be a splendid poem to put into a 
book of Scottish Antiquities, but this is no proof the idea 
itself of the poem may not already have existed in the bard's 
soul, and ripe for expression before the request has been 
made. In the case of the genesis of **Tam o' Shanter," 
one can easily conceive that this was so, and the unusual 
swiftness with which the poem was composed — the piece 
was worded in one day — only shows that the ripeness for 
C-c 



34 PRE FA TOR Y NO TICE. 



expression and power of the idea was such that the poet 
could find no rest until he had put it into words. Hence 
his evident delight upon its completion. His soul had 
been delivered of a burden, and the jewel thus ushered 
into the light of day was to him doubly dear from the 
uncommon throes he had endured at its sudden birth. 
Of all his poetic products he deemed this poem his 
best ; and it is in verity a masterpiece, and if he 
did not write anything after its composition equally 
precious on as large a scale, many of the songs which 
he afterwards produced are worthy of its company. 
That many of the said songs are equally worthless is 
also true, and one cannot but sympathise with those 
critics who regret tliat so much of his time should have 
been frittered away in their production. ^Vith such 
critics, however, one must stop here. When they go on 
to sa}'- that such time might have been utilised in the 
writing of more elaborate poems, or poems on a larger 
scale, they seem to write under an imperfect impression 
of the circumstances under which the poet laboured. 
These circumstances, comprising his inner as well as 
outer conditions, were such, as Principal Shairp has 
pointed out, as to render the concentrated effort essential 
to the production of great poems, a thing all but im- 
possible to Burns, and these circumstances grew 
gradually worse and worse after his removal to Dumfries, 
and only terminated in an illness under which he died 
in his thirty-eighth year, 21st July 1796. One word 
more in conclusion. That Burns fell the victim of errors 
and embarrassments, into which he had been mainly 
hurried by his passions, there can be no doubt ; but that 
these passions sprang from the same fount from which 
sprang all that is noblest in Burns as a man and a poet, 
and were in some sort the natural concomitants of the 



PRE FA TOR V NO T/CE. 35 



latter — as has been herein stated — one cannot bat think 
is also obvious, and ought never to be lost sight of in an)' 
estimate we would form of his character. For such an 
estimate, again, we ought in particular to study his 
poems. Many valuable facts as to his life have, no 
doubt, been recorded by himself and by his contem- 
poraries, but these have come down to us mixed up with 
much gabble that is worse to us, as data, than if it were 
merely without any value ; whereas his best poems nevej- 
lie. and whatever may be said of the man and his genius 
in other respects, Burns the man and Burns the poet 
are at least inseparable. The defects of the one are the 
defects of the other, but then so is all that is true and 
tender and sweet and noble and sublime and glorious; 
and if we would throw the former into one of our critical 
scales and the latter into the otiier, can we have doubt 
as to which of those scales would at once be made to kick 
the beam ? All in all, then, the instinct is in the main 
right which has enabled the people to see in Burns one 
of the noblest of men, as he is in verity not only one of 
the noblest of poets, but one of our two most supreme 
poets, whose songs above those of all others have found a 
home in the hearts of the people. Need I say that other 
is Shakespeare ? 

JOSErH SKIPSEY. 
Jiyril 1885. 



^^ 



Burne'e poetical Morks. 



POEMS. 



THE COTTAR'S SATURDAY NIGHT. 

INSCRIBED TO ROBERT AIKEN, ESQ. 

" Let not ambition mock their useful toil, 
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure ; 

Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile, 
The short but simple annals of the poor." 

—Gray. 

MY loved, my honour'd, inuch-respected friend ! 
No mercenary bard his homage pays ; 
With honest pride, I scoin each selfish end : 

My dearest meed, a friend's esteem and praise : 
To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays, 

The lowly train in life's sequester'd scene ; 

The native feelings strong, the guileless ways : 

What Aiken in a cottage would have been ; 

Ah ! though his worth unknown, far happier there, I 

ween ! 



SS CO r TAR'S SA TURD A Y NIGHT. 



November chill bkws lend wi' angry sugh ; 

The short'ning winter-day is near a close ; 
The mir}' beasts retreating irae the pleugh ; 

The black'ning trains o' craws to their repose ; 
The toil-worn cottar frae his labour goes, 

This night his weekly moil is at an end, 
Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes, 

Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend, 
And weary, o'er the moor, his course doeshameward bend. 

At length his lonely cot appears in view, 

Beneath the shelter of an aged tree ; 
Th' expectant wee things, toddlin', stacher through, 

To meet their dad, wi' flichterin' noise and glee. 
His wee bit ingle, blinking bonnily, 

His clean hearthstane, his thrifty wifie's smile, 
The lisping infant prattling on his knee. 

Does a' his weary carking cares beguile, 
And makes Iiim quite forget his labour and his toil. 

Belyve, the elder bairns come drapping in. 

At service out amang the farmers roun* : 
Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie rin 

A canny errand to a neibor town : 
Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown, 

In youthfu* bloom, love sparkling in her e'e, 
Comes hame, perhaps to show a braw new gown, 

Or deposit her sair-won penny-fee. 
To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be. 

Wi' joy unfeign'd brothers and sisters meet. 
And each for other's welfare kindly spiers : 

The social hours, swift-wing'd, unnoticed, fleet ; 
Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears ; 



CO TTAR'S SA TURD A V NIGHT. 39 



The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years ; 

Anticipation forward points the view. 
The mother, wi' her needle and her shears, 

Gars anld claes look amaist as weel's the new — 
The father mixes a* wi' admonition due. 

Their master*s and their mistress's command 

The younkers a* are warned to obey ; 
And mind their labours wi' an eydent hand, 

And ne'er, though out 0' sight, to jauk or play : 
** And oh ! be sure to fear the Lord alway ! 

And mind your duty, duly, morn and night I 
Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, 

Implore His counsel and assisting might : 
They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright ! " 

But, hark ! a rap comes gently to the door, 

Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same, 
Tells how a heibor lad cam o'er the moor, 

To do some errands, and convoy her hame. 
The wily mother sees the conscious flame 

Sparkle in Jenny's e'e, and flush her cheek, 
Wi' heart-struck anxious care, inquires his name, 

While Jenny haffiins is afraid to speak ; 
Weel pleased the mother hears it's nae wild, worthless 
rake. 

Wi' kindly welcome Jenny brings him ben ; 

A strappin' youth ; he taks the mother's eye ; 
Blithe Jenny sees the visit's no ill ta'en ; 

The father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye. 
The youngster's artless heart o'erflows wi' joy. 

But blate and lathefu', scarce can weel behave ; 



40 CO TTAR'S SA TURD A V NIGH 71 



The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can spy 

What makes the youth sae bashi'u* and sae grave ; 
Weel pleased to think her bairn's respected like the lave. 

happy love ! — where love like this is found !— 

O heart-felt raptures ! — bliss beyond compare 1 
I've paced much this weary, mortal round, 

And sage experience bids me this declare — 
" If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare, 

One cordial in this melancholy vale, 
*Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair, 

In other's arms, breathe out the tender tale, 
Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the evening 
gale." 

Is there, in human form, that bears a heart, 

A wretch ! a villain ! lost to love and truth ! 
That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art. 

Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth ? 
Curse on his perjured arts ! dissembling smooth ! 

Are honour, virtue, conscience, all exiled ? 
Is there no pity, no relenting ruth, 

Points to the parents fondling o'er their child ? 
Then paints the ruin'd maid, and their distraction wild ! 

But now the supper crowns their simple board. 

The halesome pan itch, chief of Scotia's food : 
The soupe their only hawkie does afford, 

That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her cood ; 
The dame brings forth, in complimental mood. 

To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd kebbuck, fell, 
And att he's prest, and aft he ca's it guid : 

The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell, 
How 'twas a towmond auld, sin' lint was i' the bell. 



COTTAR'S SA TURDA V NIGHT. 41 



The cheerfu* supper done, wi' aerions face, 

They, round the ingle, form a circle wide ; 
The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace, 

The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride ; 
His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside, 

His lyart haffets wearing thin and bare ; 
Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, 

He wales a portion with judicious care ; 
And " Let us worship God ! " he says, with solemn air. 

They chant their artless notes in simple guise ; 

They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim : 
Perhaps *' Dundee's" wild-warbling measures rise, 

Or plaintive ** Martyrs," worthy of the name ; 
Or noble ** Elgin " beets the heaven-ward flame, 

The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays : 
Compared with these, Italian trills are tame ; 

The tickled ear no heartfelt raptures raise ; 
Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise, 

The priest-like father reads the sacred page, 

How Abram was the friend of God on high ; 
Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage 

With Amalek's ungracious progeny: 
Or how the royal bard did groaning lie 

Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire ; 
Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry ; 

Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire ; 
Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. 

Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, 
How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed ; 

How He, who bore in heaven the second name, 
Had not on earth whereon today His head : 



4^ CO TTAR'S SA TURD A V NIGHT. 



How His first followers and servants sped, 
The precepts sage they wrote to many a land : 

How he, who lone in Patmos banished, 
Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand ; 
And heard great BaVlon's doom pronounced by Heaven's 

command. 

Then kneeling down, to Heaven's eternal Krxfi, 

The saint, the father, and the husband prays: 
Hope " sprin<:s exulting on triumphant wing," 

That thus they all shall meet in future days : 
There ever bask in uncreated rays, 

Ko m.ore to sigh or shed the bitter tear, 
Together hymning their Creator's praise, 

In such society, yet still more dear ; 
While circling time moves round in an eternal sphere. 

Compared with this, how poor religion's pride, 

In all the pomp of method and of art, 
"When men display to congregations wide 

Devotion's every grace, except the heart ! 
The Tower, incensed, the pageant will desert. 

The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole : 
But, haply, in some cottage far apart, 

May hear, well pleased, the language of the soul ; 
And in His book of life the inmates poor enrol. 

Then homeward all take off their several way ; 

The youngling cottagers retire to rest : 
The parent-pair their secret homage pay, 

And proffer up to Heaven the warm request 
That He, who stills the raven's clamorous nest, 

And decks the lily fair in flowery pride, 



CO TTAR'S SA TURD A V NIGHT, 43 



Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best, 
For them and for their little ones provide ; 
lUit, chiefly, in their hearts with grace divine preside. 

From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, 

That makes her loved at home, revered abroad ; 
Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, 

'* An honest man's the noblest work of God ; " 
And certes, in fair virtue's heavenly road, 

The cottage leaves the palace far behind. 
What is the lordling's pomp? — a cumbrous load, 

Disguising olt the wretch of human kind, 
i^tudied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined I 

Scotia ! my dear, my native soil ! 

For whom my wannest wish to Heaven is sent, 
Loiig may thy hardy sons of rustic toil 

Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content 1 
And, oh ! may Heaven their simple lives prevent 

From luxury's contagion, weak and vile ! 
Tb.en, howe'er crown and coronets be rent, 

A virtuous populace may rise the while, 
And stand a wall of lire around their much-loved isle. 

Tliou ! wh.o pour'd the patriotic tide 

That stream'd through Wallace's undaunted heart: 
Who dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride, 

Or nobly die, the second glorious part 
(The patriot's God, peculiarly Thou art, 

His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward I) 
Oh, never, never, Scotia's realm desert ; 

But still the patriot, and the p;itriot-bard. 
In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard I 



44 TAM 0' SHANTER. 

TAM 0' SHANTER : 

A TALE. 

WHEN chapman billies leave the street, 
And drouthy neibors neibons meet, 
As market days are wearin' late, 
And lolk begin to tak the gate ; 
Wliile we sit bousing at the nappy, 
And gettin* fou and unco happy, 
We think na on the lang Scots miles, 
The mosses, waters, slaps, and stiles. 
That lie between us and our hanie, 
Whare sits our sulky sullen dame, 
Gathering her brows like gathering storm, 
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm. 

This truth fand honest Tam o' Shanter, 
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter 
(Auld Ayr, wham ne'er a town surpasses 
For honest men and bonny lasses). 

Tam ! hadst thou but been sae wise 
As ta'en thy ain wife Kate's advice ! 
She tauld thee weel thou wast a skellnm, 
A blethering, blusterinf]^, drunken blellum ; 
That frae November till October, 
Ae market-day thou wasna sober ; 
That ilka melder, wi' the miller 
Thou sat as lang as thou hadst siller ; 
That every naig was ca'd a shoe on. 
The smith and thee gat roaring fou on ; 
That at the Lord's house, even on Sunday, 
Thou drank wi* Kirkton Jean till Monday. 

/ She prophesied that, late or soon, 

1 Thou would'st be found deep drown'd in Doon ! 



Or catch'd wi* warlocks i' the mirk, 
By Alio way's auld haunted kirk. 

Ah, gentle dames ! it gars me greet 
To think how mony counsels sweet, 
How mony lengthened, sage advices, 
The husband frae the wife despises ! 

But to our tale : — Ae market night, 
Tam had got planted unco right, 
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely, 
Wi' reaming swats, that drank divinely ; 
And at his elbow, Souler Johnny, 
His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony ; 
Tam loed him like a vera brither — 
They had been fou for weeks thegither ! 
The night drave on wi* sangs and clatter, 
And aye the ale was growing better : 
The landlady and Tam grew gracious, 
Wi' favours secret, sweet, and precious ; 
The Souter tauld his queerest stories, 
The landlord's laugh was ready chorus : 
The storm without might lair and rustle — 
Tam didna mind the storm a whistle. 

Care, mad to see a man sae happy. 
E'en drown'd himsel amang the nappy I 
As bees flee hame wi' lades o* treasure, 
The minutes wing'd their way wi* pleasure : 
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious, 
0*er a' the ills o' life victorious ! 

But pleasures are like poppies spread^ 
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed ! 



46 TAM O' SHANTER. 



Or like the snowfall in the river, 

A moment white — then melts for ever ; 

Or like the borealis race, 

That flit ere you can point their phice ; 

Or like the rainbow's lovely form, 

Evanishing amid the storm. 

Nae man can tether time or tide ; 

The hour approaches Tam maun ride ; 

That hour, o' night's black arch the keystaiu^ 

That dreary hour he mounts his beast in ; 

And sic a niglit he taks the road in 

As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in. 

The wind blew as 'twad blawn its last ; 
The rattling showers rose on the blast ; 
^The speedy gleams the darkness swallow'd ; 
Loud, deep, and lang, the thunder bellowd : 
That night, a child might understand, 
The deil had business on his hand. 

Weel mounted on his grey mare, Meg, 
A better never lifted leg, 
Tarn skelpit on through dub and mire, 
Despising wind, and rain, and fire ; 
Whiles holding fast his guid blue-bonnet, 
Whiles crooning o'er some auld Scots sonnet : 
Whiles glowering round wi' prudent cares. 
Lest bogles catch him unawares : 
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh, 
Whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry. 

By this time he was 'cross the foord, 
Whare in the snaw the chapman smoor'd ; 
And past the birks and meikle stane 
Whare drunken Charlie brak's neck- bane ; 



TAM O' SHANTER. 47 



And through the whins, and by the cairn 
Whare hunters fand the murder'd bairn ; 
And near the thorn, aboon the well, 
AVhare Munojo's mither hang'd hersel. 
Before him Doon pours a' his floods ; 
The doubling storm roars through the woods ; 
The lightnings flash frae pole to pole ; 
Near and more near the thunders roll ; 
When, glimmering through the groaning trees, 
Kirk-Alloway seem'd in a bleeze ; 
Through ilka bore the beams were glancing, 
And loud resounded mirth and dancing. 



Inspiring bold John Barleycorn ! 

What dangers thou canst mak us scorn ! 

Wi' tippenny, we fear nae evil ; 

Wi' usquebae, we'll face the devil ! — 

The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's noddle. 

Fair pla}^, he cared na deils a boddle. 

But Maggie stood right sair astonish 'd, 

Till, by the heel and hand admonish'd, 

She ventured forward on the light ; 

And, wow ! Tarn saw an unco sight ! 

Warlocks and witches in a dance ; 

Nae cotillon brent-new frae France, 

But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels, 

Put life and mettle i' their heels : 

At winnock banker, i' the east, 

There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast ; 

And towzie tyke, black, grim, and large, 

To gie them music was his charge ; 

He screw'd the pipes, and gart them skirl, 

Till roof and rafters a' did dirl. 



48 TAM O' SHANTER. 



Coffins stood round, like open presses, 
That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses ; 
And by some devilish cantrip slight 
Each in its cauld hand held a light — 
By whicli heroic Tam was able 
To note upon the haly table, 
A murderer's banes in gibbet aims ; 
Twa span-laug, wee, unchristen'd bairns ; 
A thief, new-cutted frae a rape, 
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape ; 
Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red-rusted ; 
Five scimitars, wi' murder crusted ; 
A garter, which a babe had strangled ; 
A kniCe, a father's throat had mangled, 
AVliom his ain son o' life bereft. 
The grey hairs yet stack to the heft : 

Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu'. 
Which even to name wad be unlawfu'. 

As Tammie glower'd, amazed and curious, 

The mirth and fun grew fast and furious : 

The piper loud and louder blew, 

The dancers quick and quicker flew : 

They reel'd, they set, they cross' d, they cleekit, 

Till ilka carlin swat and reekit. 

And coost her duddies to the wark, 

And linket at it in her sark. 

Now Tam ! Tam ! had thae been queans, 
A' plump and strappin* in their teens. 
Their sarks, instead o' creeshie flannen, 
Been snaw-white seventeen-hunder linen ! 
Tliir breeks o' mine, my only pair, 
That ance were plush, o' guid blue hair, 



TAM O' SHANTER. 49 



I wad hae gien them aff my hurdles, 
For ae blink o' the bonny burdies ! 

But wither'd beldams, auld and droll, 
Rigwoodie hags, wad spean a foal, 
Low[»in* and Hingin' on a cummock, 
^ I wonder didna turn thy stomach. 

/ But Tam kenn'd what was what fu' brawlie," 
" There was ae winsome wench and walie," 
That night enlisted in the core 
(Lang after kenn'd on Carrick shore ; 
For mony a beast to dead she shot, 
And perished mony a bonny boat, 
And shook baith meikle corn and bear, 
And kept the country-side in fear). 
Her cutty saik, o' Paisley harn, 
That, while a lassie, she had worn, 
I In longitude though sorely scanty, 
V It was her best, and she was vauntie. 

Ah ! little kenn'd thy reverend grannie, 
That sark she coft for her wee Nannie, 
Wi' twa punds Scots ('twas a' her riches), 
Wad ever graced a dance 0' witches ! 

But here my Muse her wing maun cour, 
Sic flights are far beyond her power ; 
To sing how Nannie lap and flang 
(A souple jade she was, and Strang), 
And how Tam stood like ane bewitch'd, 
And thought his very e'en enricli'd ; 
Even Satan glower'd, and fidged fu* fain, 
And hotch'd and blew wi' might and m^iii ; 
P-d 



50 TAM 0' SHANTER, 



Till first ae caper, syne aiiither, 

Tarn tint his reason a' tbegither, 

And roars out, *' Weel done, Cutty-sark ! " 

And in an instant a' was dark : 

And scarcely had he Magoie rallied, 

When out the hellish legion sallied. 

As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke, 

AVhen ])lundering herds assail their byke, 

As open pussie's mortal foes, 

When, pop ! she starts before their nose ; 

As eager runs the market-crowd, 

When *' Catch the thief ! " resounds aloud ; 

So Maggie runs, the witches follow, 

Wi* mony an eldritch screech and hollow. 



j Ah, Tarn ! ah, Tam ! thou'lt get thy fairiu* I 
I In hell they'll roast thee like a herrin' ! 
In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin' ! 
Kate soon will be a woefu* woman ! 
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, 
And win the keystane of the brig ; 
There at them thou thy tail may toss, 
A running stream they darena cross ; 
But ere the keystane she could make, 
The fient a tail she had to shake ! 
For Nannie, far before the rest, 
Hard upon noble Maggie prest, 
And flew at Tam wi' lurious ettle ; 
But little wist she Maggie's mettle — 
Ae spring brought off her master hale, 
And left behind her ain grey tail : 
The carlin ciaught her by the rump. 
And left jooi Maggie scarce a stump, 



THE TWA DOGS. 51 



Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read, 
Ilk man and mother's son, take heed : 
Whane'er to drink you are inclined, 
Or cutty-sarks run in your mind, 
Think ! ye may buy the joys owre dear- 
Rememher Tain 0' Shanter's mare. 



THE TWA DOGS. 

A TALE. 

''TT^WAS in that place o' Scotland's isle, 

X That bears the name o' auld King Coil, 
Upon a bonny day in June, 
When wearing through the afternoon, 
Twa dogs that werena thrang at hame, 
Forgather'd ance upon a time. 

The first I'll name, they ca'd him Caesar, 
Was keepit for his honour's pleasure ; 
His hair, his size, his mouth, his lugs, 
Show'd he was nane o' Scotland's dogs ; 
But whalpit some place far abroad. 
Where sailors gang to fish for cod. 

His locked, letter'd, braw brass collar 
Showed him the gentleman and scholar ; 
But though he was o* high degree, 
The fient a pride — nae pride had he ; 
But wad hae spent an hour caressin', 
Even wi' a tinkler-gypsy's mebsan : 
At kirk or market, mill or smiddie, 
Nae tawted tyke, though e'er sae duddie, 



52 THE TWA DOGS. 



But he wad stan*t, as glad to see him, 
And stroan't on stanes and hillocks wi* him. 

The tither was a ploughman's collie, 

A rhyming, ranting, roving billie, 

Wha for his friend and comrade had him, 

And in his freaks had Luatli ca'd him, 

After some dog in Higliland sang. 

Was made lang syne — Lord knows how lang. 

He was a gash and faithfu' tyke, 
As ever lap a sheugh or dike. 
His honest, sonsie, baws'nt face. 
Aye gat him friends in ilka place. 
His breast was white, his touzie back 
Weel clad wi' coat o' glossy black ; 
His gaucie tail, wi* upward curl, 
Hung o'er his hurdles wi' a swirl. 

Nae doubt but they were fain o' ither, 

And unco pack and thick thegither ; 

Wi' social nose whyles snuff 'd and snowkifc, 

Whyles mice and moudieworts they howkit ; 

Whyles scour'd awa' in lang excursion, 

And worried ither in diversion ; 

Until wi' dafhu' weary grown, 

Upon a knowe they sat them down, 

And there began a lang digression 

About the lords o' the creation. 

G2E&XK. 

I've often wondered, honest Luath, 
What sort o' life poor dogs like you have • 



THE TWA DOGS. 53 



And when the gentry's life I saw, 

What way poor bodies lived ava. 

Our laird gets in his racked rents, 

His coals, his kain, and a' his stents ; 

He rises when he likes himsel ; 

His flunkies answer at the bell ; 

He ca's his coach, he ca's his horse ; 

He draws a bonny silken purse 

As lang's my tail, whare, through the stenks 

The yellow-letter'd Geordie keeks. 

Frae morn to e'en it's nought but toiling, 
At baking, roasting, frying, boiling ; 
And though the gentry first are stechin. 
Yet e'en the ha* folk fill their pechan 
Wi' sauce, ragouts, and siclike trash trie, 
That's little short o' downright wastrie. 
Our whipper-in, wee, blastit wonner, 
Poor worthless elf, it eats a dinner 
Better than ony tenant man 
His honour has in a' the Ian' ; 
And what poor cot-folk pit their painch in, 
I own it's past my coraprehen'sion. 



Trowth, Caesar, whyles theyr'e fasht eneiigh \ 

A Cottar howkin' in a sheugh, 

Wi' dirty stanes biggin* a dike, 

Baring a quarry, and siclike ; 

Himsel, a wife, he thus sustains, 

A smytrie 0' wee duddie weans, 

And nought but his ban' darg to keep 

Them right and tight in thack and rape. 



THE TWA DOGS. 



Ai'd when they meet wi' sair disasters, 
Like loss o' health or want o' masters, 
Ye maist wad think, a wee touch langer, 
And they maun starve o' cauld and hunger 
But how it comes I never kenn'd yet, 
Tliey're maistly wonderfu' contented : 
And buirdly chiels, and clever hizzies, 
Are bred in sic a way as this is. 

C^SAR. 

P>ut then to see how ye're negleckit, 
How hutf'd, and cutf'd, and disrespeckit ! 
Lord, man, our gentry care as little 
For delvers, ditchers, and sic cattle ; 
They gang as saucy by poor folk 
As I wad b}* a stinkin' brock. 
I've noticed, on our laird's court-day, 
^nd mony a time my heart's been wae, 
Poor tenant bodies, scant o' cash, 
How they maun thole a factor's snash : 
He'll stamp and threaten, curse and swear, 
He'll apprehei^d them, poind their gear ; 
While they maun stan', wi' aspect humble, 
And hear it a', and fear and tremble ! 

I see how folk live that hae riches ; 
But surely poor folk maun be w^retches I 

LUATH. 

They're no sac wretched's ane wad think ; 
Though constantly on poortith's brink : 
They're sae accustom'd wi' the sight, 
The view o't gies them little fright. 



THE TWA DOGS, 55 



Then chance and fortune are sae guided, 
They're aye in less or mair provided ; 
And though fatigued wi' close employment. 
A blink 0' rest's a sweet enjoyment. 

The dearest comfort o' their lives, 
Their grushie weans and faith fu' wives | 
The prattling things are just their pride^ 
That sweetens a' their lire-side ; 
And whyles twalpennie worth o' nappy 
Can mak the bodies unco happy ; 
They lay aside their private cares, 
To mind the Kirk and State affairs : 
They'll talk o' patronage and priests, 
Wi' kindling fury in their breasts ; 
Or tell what new taxation's comin', 
And ferlie at the folk in Lon'on. 

As bleak-faced Hallowmas returns, 
They get the jovial ranting kirns, 
When rural life o' every station 
Unite in common recreation ; 
Love blinks, Wit slaps, and social Mirth 
Forgets there's Care upo' the earth. 

That merry day the year begins 

They bar the door on frosty win's ; 

The nappy reeks wi' mantling ream, 

And sheds a heart-inspiring steam ; 

The luntin pipe and sneeshin mill 

Are handed round wi' right guid will ; 

The cantie auld folks crackin' crouse, 

The young anes ran tin' through the house,- 



S6 THE TWA DOGS, 



My heart has been sae fain to see them^ 
That I for joy hae barkit wi' them. 

Still it's owre true that ye hae said, 
Sic game is now owre aften play'd. 
There's mony a creditable stock 
O' decent, honest, fawsont folk, 
Are riven out baith root and branch, 
Some rascal's pridefu' greed to quench, 
Wha thinks to knit himsel the faster 
In favour wi' some gentle master, 
Wha aiblins thiang a parliamentin' 
For Britain's guid his saul indentin' — 

Haith, lad, ye little ken about it ; 

For Briton's guid ! guid faith, I doubt it. 

Say rather, gaun as Premiers lead him ; 

And saying Ay or No's they bid him : 

At operas and plays parading, 

Mortgaging, gambling, masquerading ; 

Or maybe, in a frolic daft, 

To Hague or Calais taks a waft. 

To mak a tour, and tak a whirl. 

To learn hon torij and see the worl'. 

There, at Vienna or Versailles, 
He rives his father's auld entails ; 
Or by Madrid he takes the route, 
To thrum guitars, and fecht wi' nowte ; 
Or down Italian vista startles, 
Whore-hunting among groves of myrtles, 
Then bouses drumly German water, 
To mak liimsel look fair and fatter. 



THE TWA DOGS. 57 



And clear the consequential sorrows, 
Love-gifts of Carnival signoras. 
For Britain's guid ! — for her destruction ! 
Wi' dissipation, feud, and faction 1 



Hech man ! dear sirs ! is that the gate 
They waste sae mony a braw estate 1 
Are we sae fought en and harass'd 
For gear to gang that gate at last ! 
Oh, would they stay aback fra courts, 
And please themselves wi' country sports, 
It wad for every ane be better, 
The Laird, the Tenant, and the Cottar ! 
For frae frank, ran tin', ramblin' billies, 
Fient haet o' them's ill-hearted fellows ; 
Except for breakin' o' their timmer, 
Or speakin' lightly o' their limmer, 
Or shootin' o' a hare or moorcock, 
The ne'er a bit they're ill to poor folk. 

But will ye tell me, Master Caesar, 
Sure great folk's life's a life o' pleasure ? 
Nae cauld nor hunger e'er can steer them, 
The very thought o't needna fear them. 

Lord, man, were ye but whyles whare I am, 
The gentles ye wad ne'er envy 'em. 
It's true they needna starve nor sweat. 
Through winter's cauld or simmer's heat ; 
They've nae sair wark to craze their banes, 
And fill auld age wi' grips and granes : 



S8 THE TWA DOGS, 



But human bodies are sic fools, 
For a' their colleges and schools, 
That when nae real ills perplex them, 
They niak enow themsels to vex tliem ; 
And aye the less they hae to start them, 
In like proportion less will hurt them. 

A country fellow at the pleugh. 
His acres till'd, he's rio^ht eneugh ; 
A country girl at her wheel, 
Her dizzens done, she's unco weel : 
But Gentlemen, and Ladies warst, 
AVi' evendown want o' wark are curst. 
They loiter, lounging, lank, and lazy ; 
Though deil haet ails them, yet uneasy ; 
Their days insipid, dull, and tasteless ; 
Their nights unquiet, lang, and restless ; 
And e'en their sports, their balls and races, 
Their galloping through public places, 
There's sic parade, sic pomp and art, 
The joy can scarcely reach the heart. 

The men cast out in party matches, 

Then sowther a' in deep debauches ; 

Ae night they're mad wi' drink and whoring, 

iS'eist day their life is past enduring. 

The Ladies arm-in-arm in clusters, 

As great and gracious a* as sisters ; 

But hear their absent thoughts o' ither, 

They're a' run deils and jads thegither. 

AVhyles, owre the wee bit cup and platie, 

They sip the scandal potion pretty : 

Or lee-lang nights, wi' crabbit leuks, 

Pore owre the devil's pictured beuks : 



THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 59 



Stake on a cliance a fainier's stackyard, 
And cheat like ony uiihang'd blackguard. 
There's some exception, man and woman ; 
But this is Gentry's life in common. 

J^>y this, the sun was out o' siglit. 
And darker gloaming brought the night ; 
The bum-clock humm'd wi' lazy drone ; 
The kye stood rowtin' i' the loan ; 
AVhen up they gat, and shook their lugs, 
Kejoiced they werena men, but dogs ; 
And each took aff his several way. 
Resolved to meet some ither day. 



THE JOLLY BEGGARS. 

A CANTATA. — P.ECITATIYO. 

WHEN lyart leaves bestrew the yird, 
Or, wavering like the baukie-bird, 
Bedim cauld Boreas' blast ; 
When hailstanes drive wi' bitter skyte, 
And infant frosts begin to bite. 
In hoary cranreuch drest ; 
Ae night at e'en a merry core 
0' randie, gangrel bodies, 
In Poosic Nansie's held the splore, 
To drink their orra duddies : 
Wi' quaffing and laughing, 

They lanted and they sang ; 
Wi' jumping and thumping, 
The vera girdle rang. 



6o THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 



First, neist the fire, in auld red rags, 
Ane sat, vveel braced wi' mealy bags. 

And knapsack a' in order ; 
His doxy lay within his arm, 
Wi' usquebae and blankets warm — • 

She blinket on her sodger ; 
And aye he gied the tousie drab 

The tither skelpin' kiss, 

While she held up her greedy gab. 

Just like an aumos dish. 

Ilk smak still, did crack still, 

Just like a cadger's whup, 
Then staggering and swaggering 
He roar'd this ditty up— 

A IE. 

Tune— "Soldier's Joy." 

I am a son of Mars, who have been in many wars, 
And show my cuts and scars wherever I come : 
This here was for a wench, and that other in a trend), 
When welcoming the French at the sound of the drum, 
Lai de dandle, etc. 

My 'preuticesbip I past where my leader breathed his 

last, 
When the bloody die was cast on the heights of Abraui ; 
I served out my trade when the gallant game was play'd, 
And the Moro low was laid at the sound of the drum. 
Lai de dandle, etc. 

I lastly was with Curtis, among the floating batteries, 
And there I loft for witness an arm and a limb j 



i 

j Yet let my country need me, with Elliot to head me, 
j I'd clatter on my stumps at the sound of the drum. 
Lai de daudle, etc. 

And now thougjh I must beg with a wooden arm and leg, 
And many a tattered rag hanging over my bum, 
I'm as happy with my wallet, my bottle, and my callet, 
As when I used in scarlet to follow a drum. 
Lai de daudle, etc. 

What though with hoary locks I must stand the winter 

shocks, 
Beneath the woods and rocks oftentimes for a home, 
AVhen the t'other bag I sell, and the t'other bottle tell, 
I could meet a troop of hell at the sound of a drum. 
Lai de daudle, etc. 

' EECITATIVO. 

He ended ; and the kebars sheuk 

Aboon the chorus roar ; 
While frighted rattons backward leuk, 

And seek the ben most bore ; 
A fairy fiddler frae the neuk, 

He skirled out *' Encore ! " 
But up arose the martial chuck, 

And laid the loud uproar. 

AIR. 

Tune— • * Soldier Laddie. " 

I once was a maid, though I cannot tell when, 
And still ray delight is in proper young men ; 



Some one of a troop of dragoons was ray daddie, 
No wonder I'm fond of a sodger laddie. 
Sing, Lai de lal, etc. 

The first of my loves was a swaggering blade, 
To rattle the thundering drum was his trade ; 
His leg was so tiglit, and his cheek was so ruddy, 
Transported I was with my sodger laddie. 
Sing, Lal de lal, etc. 

But the godly old chaplain left him in the lurch, 
The sword I forsook for the sake of the church ; 
He ventured the soul, and I risk'd the body, 
'Twas then I proved false to my sodger laddie. 
Sing, Lal de lal, etc. 

Full soon I ^rew sick of my sanctified sot, 
The regiment at large for a husband I got ; 
From the gilded spontoon to the fife I was ready, 
I asked no more but a sodger laddie. 
Sing, Lal de lal, etc. 

But the peace it reduced me to beg in despair, 
Till I met my old boy at a Cunningham fair ; 
His rags regimental they flutter'd so gaudy, 
My heart it rejoiced at a sodger laddie. 
Sing, Lal de lal, etc. 

And now I have lived — I know not how long. 

And still I can join in a cup or a song : 

But whilst with both hands I can hold the glass 

steady, 
Here's to thee, my hero, my sodger laddie. 
Sing, Lal de lal, etc. 



THE JOLLY BEGGARS, 63 



EECITATIVO. 

Poor Merry Andrew in the neuk, 

Sat guzzling wi' a tinkler liizzie ; 
They niind't na wha the chorus teuk, 

Between themselves they were sae busy 
At length wi' drink and courting dizzy, 

He stoiter'd up and made a lace ; 
Then turn'd, and laid a smack on Grizzie, 

Syne tuned his pipes wi' grave grimace- 



TuNE — '* Auld Sir Symon." 

Sir Wisdom's a fool when he's fou, 
Sir Knave is a fool in a session ; 

He's there but a 'prentice, I trow, 
But I am a fool by profession. 

My grannie she bought me a beuk, 
And I held awa' to the school ; 

I fear I my talent misteuk, 
But what will ye hae of a fool ? 

For drink I would venture my neck, 
A hizzie's the half o' my craft, 

But what could ye other expect, 
Of ane that's avowedly daft ? 



I ance was tied up like a stirk. 
For civilly swearing and quaffing 

I ance was abused in the kirk, 
For touzling a lass i' my datfin, 



64 THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 



Poor Andrew that tumbles for sport, 
Let naebody name wi* a jeer: 

There's even, I'm tauld, i' the court 
A tumbler ca'd the Premier, 

Observed ye yon reverend lad 
Mak faces to tickle the mob I 

He rails at our mountebank squad — 
It's rivalship just i' the job. 

And now my conclusion I'll tell, 
For faith I'm confoundedly dry ; 

The chiel that's a fool for himsel, 
Gude Lord ! he's far dafter than I. 

RECITATIVO. 

Then neist outspak a raucle carlin, 
AVha ken't fu* weel to cleek the sterling, 
For mony a pursie she had hookit, 
And had in mony a well been doukit. 
Her dove had been a Highland laddie, 
But weary fa* the waefu' woodie ! 
AVi* sighs and sobs she thus began 
To wail her braw John High landman— 

AIR. 

Tune — '* Oh, an ye were Dead, Guidman ! '" 

A Highland lad my love was born, 
The Lawland laws he held in scorn ; 
But he still was faithfu' to his clan, 
My gallant br^w John Highlandman. 



THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 



Sing, hey my braw John Highlandman ! 
Sing, ho my braw John Highlandman ! 
There's not a lad in a* the Ian' 
Was match for my John Highlandman. 

With his philabeg and tartan plaid, 
And guid claymore down by his side, 
The ladies' hearts he did trepan, 
My gallant braw John Highlandman. 
Sing, hey, etc. 



I We rangM a' from Tweed to Spey, 

\ And lived like lords and ladies gay ; 

I For a Lawland face he fearM none, 

I My gallant braw John Highlandman. 
i Sing, hey, etc. 

They banish'd him beyond the sea, 
But ere the bud was on the tree, 
Adown my cheeks the pearls ran, 
Embracing my John Highlandman. 
, Sing, hey, etc. 

[ But, oh ! they catch'd him at the last, 

And bound him in a dungeon fast ; 
\ My curse upon them every one, 

; They've hang'd my braw John Highlandman. 

[ Sing, hey, etc. 

\ And now a widow, I must mourn 

The pleasures that will ne'er return ; 
Nae comfort but a hearty can, 
When I think on John Highlandman. 
Sing, hey, etc. 
E-e 



66 THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 



RECITATIVO. 

A pigmy scraper, wi' his fiddle, 

Wha used at trysts and fairs to driddle, 

Her strappin' limb and gaucy middle 

(He reach'd nae higher) 
Had holed his heartie like a riddle, 

And blawn't on fire. 

Wi' hand on haunch, and upward e*e, 
He croon'd his gamut, one, two, three, 
Then in an arioso key, 

The wee Apollo, 
Set off wi' allegretto glee 

His giga solo. 

AIR. 

TuxE — '* Whistle owre the lave o't." 

Let me ryke up to dight that tear, 
And go wi' me and be my dear, 
And then your every care and fear 
Myy whistle owre the lave o't. 

CH0RU8. 

I am a fiddler to my trade, 
And a' the tunes that e'er I play'd, 
The sweetest still to wife or maid. 
Was whistle owre the lave o't. 

At kirns and weddings we'se be there, 
And oh ! sae nicel3^'s we will fare ; 
We'll bouse about till Daddy Care 
Sings whistle owre the lave o't. 

I am, etc. 



THE JOLL V BEGGA RS. 67 


Sae merrily the banes we'll pyke, 
And sun onrsels about the dike, 
And at our leisure, when ye like, 
We'll whistle o'er tiie lave o't. 

I am, etc. 


But bless me wi' your heaven 0' charms, 
And while I kittle hair on thairms. 
Hunger, cauld, and a' sic harms. 
May whistle owre the lave o't. 

I am, etc. 


EECITATIVO. 


Her charms had struck a sturdy caird, 
As weel as poor gut-scraper ; 

He taks the fiddler hy the beard, 
And draws a roosty rapier — 


He swore by a' was swearing worth, 
To speet him like a pliver, 

Unless he wad from that time forth 
Relinquish her for ever. 


Wi' ghastly e'e, poor Tweedle-dee 
Upon his hunkers bended, 

And pray'd for grace wi' ruefu' face, 
And sae the quarrel ended. 


But though his little heart did grieve 
When round the tinkler press'd her, 

He feign 'd to snirtle in his sleeve. 

When thus the caird address'd her : — 



68 THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 

AIR. 

Tune— ''Clout the Caudron." 

My bonny iass, I work in brass, 

A tinkler is my station : 
I've travell'd round all Christian ground 

In this my occupation. 
I've ta'en the gold, I've been enroll'd 

In many a noble squadron : 
But vain they search'd, when off I march'd 

To go and clout the caudron. 

I've ta'en the gold, etc. 

Despise that shrimp, that wither'd imp, 

Wi' a' his noise and ca'prin', 
And tak a share wi' those that bear 

The budget and the apron. 
And by that stoup, my faith and houp, 

And by that dear Kilbagie, 
If e'er ye want, or meet wi' scant, 

May I ne'er weet my craigie. 

And by that stoup, etc. 

RECITATIVO. 

The caird prevail'd — the unblushing fair 

In his embraces sunk. 
Partly wi' love, o'ercome sae sair, 

And partly she was drunk. 
Sir Violino, with an air 

That show'd a man of spunk, 
Wish'd unison between the pair, 

And made the bottle clunk 

To their health that niorht. 



THE JOLL V BEGGARS. 69 



But urcliin Cupid shot a shaft 

That play'd a dame a shavie, 
The fiddler raked her fore and aft, 

Ahint the chicken cavie. 
Her lord, a wight o' Homer's craft. 

Though limping wi' the spavie, 
He hirpled up, and lap like daft, 

And shored them Dainty Davie 
0' boot that night. 

He was a care-defying blade 

As ever Bacchus listed, 
Though Fortune sair upon him laid, 

His heart she ever miss'd it. 
He had na wish but — to be glad, 

Nor want but — when he thirsted ; 
He hated nought but — to be sad. 

And thus the Muse suggested 

His sang that night ; — • 

AIR. 

Tune—** For a' that, and a' that." 

I am a bard of no regard, 

Wi' gentle folks, and a* that : 

But Homer-like, the glowrin' byke, 
Frae town to town I draw that. 

CHORUS. 

For a' that, and a' that, 
And twice as muckle's a' that ; 

I've lost but ane, I've twa behin', 
I've wife enou^^h for a' that. 



70 THE JOLL V BEGGARS, 
I 

I I never drank the Muses' stank, 

Castalia's burn, and a' that ; 
But there it streams, and richly reams. 
My Helicon I ca' that. 

\ For a' that, etc. 

Great love I bear to a' the fair, 
Their humble slave, and a' that ; 

But lordly will, I hold it still 
A mortal sin to thraw that. 

For a' that, etc. 

In raptures sweet, this hour we meet, 
Wi' mutual love, and a' that : 

But for how lang the flee may stang. 
Let inclination law that. 

For a' that, etc. 

Their tricks and craft hae put me daft, 
They've ta'en me in, and a' that ; 

But clear your decks, and here's the sex ! 
I like the jads for a' that. 



For a' that, and a' that, 

And twice as muckle's a' that ; 

My dearest bluid, to do them guid. 
They're welcome till't for a' that. 

RECITATIVO. 

So sang the bard— and ISTansie's wa's 
Shook wi' a thunder of applause, 
Re-echoed from each mouth ; 



THE JOLL V BEGGARS, 7 1 



They toom'd their pokes and pawn'd their duds, 
They scarcely left to co'er tlieir fuds, 
To quench their lowin' drouth. 

Then owre again, the jovial thrang, 

The poet did request. 
To loose his pack and wale a sang, 
A ballad o' the best ; 

He, rising, rejoicing, 

Between his twa Deborahs, 
Looks round him, and found them 
Impatient for the chorus. 

AIR. 

Tune — ** Jolly Mortals, fill your Glasses." 

See ! the smoking bowl before us, 

Mark our jovial ragged ring ! 
Round and round take up the chorus, 

And in raptures let us sing. 

CHORUS. 

A fig for those by law protected ! 

Liberty's a glorious feast ! 
Courts for cowards were erected. 

Churches built to please the priest. 

What is title ? what is treasure ? 

What is reputation's care ?. 
If we lead a life of pleasure, 

'Tis no matter how or where. 

A fig, etc. 



7 2 THE JOLL V BEGGA RS, 



With the ready trick and fable, 
Round we wander all the day ; 

And at night, in barn or stable, 
Hug our doxies on the hay. 

A fig, etc. 

Does the train-attended carriage 
Through the country lighter rove ? 

Does the sober bed of marriage 
Witness brighter scenes of love? 
A fig, etc. 

Life is all a variorum, 

We regard not how it goes ; 

Let them cant about decorum 
Who have characters to lose. 

A fig, etc. 

Here's to budgets, bags, and wallets ! 

Here's to all the wandering train 1 
Here's our ragged brats and callets I 

One and all cry out — Amen ! 

A fig, etc 




SCOTCH DRINK, yi, 



SCOTCH DRINK. 

LET other poets raise a fracas, 
'Bout vines, and wines, and drucken 
Bacchus, 
And crabbit names and stories wrack us, 

And grate our lug, 
I sing the juice Scotch beare can mak us, 
In glass or jug. 

thon, my Muse ! guid auld Scotch drink, 
Whether through wimplin* worms thou jink, 
Or, richly brown, ream o'er the brink, 

In glorious faem, 
Inspire me, till I lisp and wink, 

To sing thy name ! 

Let husky wheat the haughs adorn, 
And aits set up their awnie horn, 
And peas and beans, at e'en or morn, 

Perfume the plain. 
Leeze me on thee, John Barleycorn, 

Thou king o' grain I 

On thee aft Scotland chows her cood, 
In souple scones, the wale o' food ! 
Or tumblin' in the boilin* flood 

Wi* kail and beef ; 
But when thou pours thy strong heart's blood, 

There thou shines chief. 

Food fills the wame, and keeps us livin' ; 
Though life's a gift no worth receivin' 



74 SCOTCH DRINK, 



When lieavy dragg'd wi' pine and grievin' ; 

But, oil'd by thee, 
The wheels o' life gae down-hill, serieviu', 

Wi' rattlin' glee. 

Thou clears the head o' doited Lear ; 
Thou cheers the heart o' drooping Care ; 
Thou strings the nerves o' Labour sair, 

At's weary toil ; 
Thou even brightens dark Despair, 

Wi' gloomy smile. 

Aft clad in massy siller weed, 
Wi' gentles thou erects thy head ; 
Yet humbly kind in time o' need, 

The poor man's wine, 
His wee drap parritch, or his bread, 

Thou kitchens fine. 

Thou art the life o' public haunts ; 

But thee, what were our fairs and rants ? 

Even godly meetings o' the saunts. 

By thee inspired, 
When gaping they besiege the tents, 

Are doubly fired. 

That merry night we get the corn in, 
Oh, sweetly then thou reams the horn in ! 
Or reekin' on a new-year morning 

In cog or bicker, 
Anj3 just a wee drap sp' ritual burn in, 

And gusty sucker I 

When Vulcan gies his bellows breath, 
And ploughmen gather wi' their graith. 



SCOTCH DRINK. 75 



Oh, rare ! to see thee fizz and freath 
r tlie lucrget caup ! 

Then Burnewin comes on like death 
At every chap. 

Nae mercy, then, for airn or steel ; 
The brawn ie, bainie, ploughman chiel, 
Brings hard owrehip, vvi' sturdy wheel, 

The strong forehammer, 
Till block and stud die ring and reel, 

Wi' dinsome clamour. 

When skirlin* weanies see the light. 
Thou maks the gossips clatter bright, 
How fumblin* cuifs their dearies slight : 

Wae worth the name ! 
Nae howdy gets a social night, 

Or plack frae them. 

When neibors anger at a plea. 
And just as wud as wud can be, 
How easy can the barley-bree 

Cement the quarrel ! 
It's aye the cheapest lawyer's fee 

To taste the barrel. 

Alake ! that e'er my Muse has reason 
To wyte her countrymen wi' treason ! 
But mony daily weet their weason 

Wi' liquors nice, 
And hardly, in a winter's season, 

E'er spier her price. 

Wae worth that brandy, burning trash ! 
Fell source 0' mony a pain and brash ! 



76 SCOTCH DRINK. 



Twins mony a poor, doylt, drucken hash 
0' half his days ; 

And sends, beside, auld Scotland's cash 
To her warst faes. 

Ye Scots, wha wish auld Scotland well ! 
Ye chief, to you my tale I tell. 
Poor plackless devils like mysel, 

It sets you ill, 
Wi* bitter, dearthfu' wines to mell, 

Or foreign gill. 

May gravels round his blether wrench, 
And gouts torment him inch by inch, 
Wha twists his gr untie wi' a glunch 

0' sour disdain, 
Out-owre a glass o* whisky punch 

Wi' honest men. 

whisky ! soul o' plays and pranks ! 
Accept a Bardie's gratefu' thanks ! 
When wanting thee, what tuneless cranks 

Are my poor verses ! 
Thou comes — they rattle i' their ranks 

At ither's a — es. 

Thee, Ferintosh ! oh, sadly lost ! 
Scotland lament frae coast to coast I 
Now colic grips, and barkin' hoast, 

May kill us a' ; 
For loyal Forbes's charter'd boast 

Is ta'en awa' ! 

Thae curst horse-leeches o' th' Excise, 
Wha mak the whisky-stells their prize ! 



THE AUTHOR'S EARNEST CRY. n 



Haud up thy han*, deil ! ance, twice, thrice ! 

There, seize the blinkers ! 
And bake them up in brunstane pies 

For poor damn'd drinkers. 

Fortune ! if thou'll but gie me still 
Hale breeks, a scone, and whisky gill, 
And rowth o' rhyme to rave at will, 

Tak a* the rest, 
And deal't about as thy blind skill 

Directs the best. 



THE AUTHOR'S EARNEST CRY AND PRAYER 

TO THE SCOTCH REPRESENTATIVES IN THE 
HOUSE OF COMMONS. 

YE Irish lords, ye knights and squires, 
Wha represent our brughs and shires, 
And doucely manage our affairs 

In parliament, 
To you a simple Bardie's prayers 

Are humbly sent. 

Alas ! my roopit Muse is hearse ! 

Your honours' heart wi' grief 'twad pierce, 

To see her sittin* on her a — e 

Low i' the dust, 
And scraichin' out prosaic verse. 

And like to burst ! 



7^ THE AUTHOR'S EARNEST CRY. 



\ Tell them wha hae the chief direction, 

\ Scotland and me's in great affliction, 

i E'er sin' they laid that curst restriction 
I On aqua vitse ; 

S And rouse them up to strong conviction, 
f And move their pity. 

\ Stand forth and tell yon Premier youth, 

I The honest, open, naked truth : 

I Tell him o' mine and Scotland's drouth, 

\ His servants humble ; 

f The muckle devil blaw ye south, 

: If ye dissemble ! 



^ Does ony great man glunch and gloom ? 

I . Speak out, and never fash your thoom ! 
r Let posts and pensions sink or soom 

I Wi' them wha grant 'em : 

If honestly they canna come, 

Far better want 'em. 

In gath'rin* votes you werena slack ; 
Now stand as tightly by your tack ; 
Ne'er claw your lug, and fidge your back, 

And hum and haw ; 
But raise your arm, and tell your crack 

Before them a'. 

Paint Scotland greetin' owre her thrissle. 
Her mutchkin stoup as toom's a whissle ; 
And damn'd excisemen in a bussle, 

Seizin' a stell. 
Triumphant crush in' 't like a mussel 

Or lam pit shell. 



Then on the tither hand present her, 

A blackguard smuggler, right behint her, 

And cheek-for-chow a chuffie vintner, 

Colleaguing join. 
Picking her pouch as bare as winter 

Of a* kind coin. 

Is there, that bears the name o' Scot, 
But feels his heart's-blood rising hot, 
To see his poor auld mither's pot 

Thus dung in staves, 
And plunder'd o' her hindmost groat 

By gallows knaves ? 

Alas ! I'm but a nameless wight. 
Trod i' the mire and out o' sight ! 
But could I like Montgomeries fight. 

Or gab like Boswell, 
There's some sark-necks I wad draw tight. 

And tie some hose well. 

God bless your honours, can ye see't, 
The kind, auld, cantie carlin greet, 
And no get warmly to your feet. 

And gar them hear it, 
And tell them wi' a patriot heat. 

Ye w^inna bear it ? 

Some o' you nicely ken the laws, 
To round the period and pause. 
And wi' rhetoric clause on clause 

To make harangues ; 
Then echo through St. Stephen's wa's 

Auld Scotland's wransfs. 



8o THE A UTHOR '5 EARNES T CR K 



Dempster, a true-blue Scot I'se warran' ; 
Thee, aith-detesting, chaste Kilkerran ; 
And that glib-gabbet Highland baron, 

The Laird o' Graham ; 
And ane, a chap that's damn'd auldfarran, 

Dundas his name. 

Erskine, a spunkie Norland billie ; 
True Campbells, Frederick and Jlay ; 
And Livingstone, the bauld Sir Willie ; 

And mony ithers, 
AVhom auld Demosthenes or TuUy 

Might own for brithers. 

Thee, Sodger Hugh, my watchman stented. 

If bardies e'er are represented ; 

I ken if that your sword were wanted, 

Ye'd lend your hand : 
But when there's ought to say anent it, 

Ye're at a stand. 

Arouse, my boys ; exert your mettle, 
To get auld Scotland back her kettle ; 
Or, faith ! I'll wad my new pleugh-pettle, 

Ye'll see 't or lang. 
She'll teach you, wi' a reekin* whittle, 

Anither sang. 

This while she's been in crankous mood, 
Her lost militia fired her bluid ; 
(Deil na they never mair do good, 

Play'd her that pliskie !) 
And now she's like to rin red-wud 

About her whisky. 



THE A UTHOR 'S EARNES T CRY. 8 1 



And, Lord, if ance they put her till't, 
Her tartan petticoat she'll kilt, 
And durk and pistol at her belt, 

She'll tak the streets, 
And rin her whittle to tlie hilt 

r th' first she meets ! 

For God's sake, sirs, then speak her fair, 
And straik her cannie wi' the hair, 
And to the muckle House repair 

Wi' instant speed. 
And strive, wi' a' your wit and lear, 

To get remead. 

Yon ill-tongued tinkler, Charlie Fox, 
May taunt you wi' his jeers and mocks ; 
But gie him't het, my jfiearty cocks ! 

E'en cowe the caddie I 
And send him to his dicing-box 

And sportin' lady. 

Tell yon guid bluid o' auld Boconnock's 
I'll be his debt twa mashlum bannocks. 
And drink his health in auld Nanse Tinnock's 

Nine times a-week. 
If he some scheme, like tea and winnocks, 

Wad kindlj'' seek. 

Could he some commutation broach, 
I'll pledge my aith in guid braid Scotch, 
He needna fear their foul reproach 

Nor erudition, 
Yon mixtie-maxtie, queer hotch-potch, 

The coalition. 
F-f 



82 THE A UTHOR 'S EA RNES T CR V. 



Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue ; 
She's just a devil wi' a rung ; 
And if she promise auld or young 

To tak their part, 
Though by the neck she should be strung, 

She'll no desert. 

And now, ye chosen Five-and-Forty, 
May still your mother's heart support ye ; 
Then though a minister grow dorty, 

And kick your place, 
Ye'll snap your fingers, poor and hearty, 

Before his face. 

God bless your honours a' your days 
Wi' sowps o* kail and brats o' claes, 
In spite 0* a* the thievish kaes 

That haunt St. Jamie's 1 
Your humble poet sings and prays 

While Rab his name is. 

POSTSCRIPT. 

Let half-starved slaves in warmer skies 
See future vines, rich clust'ring, rise ; 
Their lot auld Scotland ne'er envies. 

But blithe and frisky, 
She eyes her free-born, martial boys, 

Tak afF their whisky. 

What though their Phoebus kinder warms. 
While fragrance blooms and beauty charms ! 
When wretches range, in famish'd swarms, 

The scented groves, 
Or, hounded forth, dishonour arms 

In hungry droves. 



THE AUTHOR'S EARNEST CRY. Z^ 



Their gun's a burthen on their shouther ; 
They downa bide the stink o' pouther ; 
Their bauldest thought's a hank'ring swither 

To stan' or rin, 
Till skelp — a shot — they're aff, a' throu'ther, 

To save their skin. 

But bring a Scotsman frae his hill, 
Clap in his cheek a Highland gill, 
Say, such is royal George's will, 

And there's the foe ; 
He has nae thought but how to kill 

Twa at a blow, 

Nae cauld, faint-hearted doubtings tease him ; 
Death comes — wi' fearless eye he sees him ; 
Wi' bluidy han' a welcome gies him ; 

And when he fa's, 
His latest draught o' breathin' lea'es him 

In faint huzzas ! 

Sages their solemn e'en may steek. 
And raise a philosophic reek, 
And physically causes seek. 

In clime and season ; 
But tell me whisky's name in Greek, 

I'll tell the reason. 

Scotland, my auld respected mither ! 
Though whiles ye moistify your leather, 
Till whare ye sit, on craps o' heather, 

Ye tine your dam ; 
Freedom and whisky gang thegither ! — 

Tak aff your dram ! 



84 THE TARBOLTON LASSES. 



THE TAEBOLTON LASSES. 

IF ye gae up to yon hill-tap, 
Ye'll there see bonny Peggy ; 
She kens her faither is a laird, 
And she forsooth's a leddy. 

There Sophy tight, a lassie bright, 
Besides a handsome fortune ; 

Wl)a canna win her in a night. 
Has little art in courtincr. 



\ Gae down by Faile, and taste the ale, 

j And tak a look o* Mysie ; 

\ She's dour and din, a deil within, 

\ But aibiins she may please ye. 

If she be shy, her sister try, 
■ Ye'll maybe fancy Jenny, 

\ If ye'll dispense wi' want o' sense — • 

J She kens hersel she's bonny. 

As ye gae up by yon hillside, 
Speir in for bonn}^ Bessy ; 

She'll gie ye a beck, and bid ye licht. 
And handsomely address ye. 

There's few sae bonnie, nane sae guid, 
In a' King George' dominion ; 

If ye should doubt the truth of this — • 
It's Bessy's ain opinion. 



1 



THE TARBOLTON LASSES. 85 



THE TARBOLTON LASSES. 

IN Tarboltou, ye ken, there are proper young men^ 
And proper young lasses and a', man ; 
But ken ye the Ronalds that live in the Bennals, 
They carry the gree frae them a', man. 

Their father's a laird, and weel he can spare't, 
Braid money to tocher them a', man. 

To proper young men, he'll clink in the hand 
Gowd guineas a hunder or twa, man. 

There's ane they ca' Jean, I'll warrant ye've seen 

As bonny a lass or as braw, man ; 
But for sense and guid taste she'll vie wi' the best, 

And a conduct that beautifies a', man. 

The charms o' the min', the langer they shine, 
The mair admiration they draw, man ; 

While peaches and cherries, and roses and lilies, 
They fade and they wither awa, man. 

If ye be for Miss Jean, tak this frae a frien*, 

A hint o' a rival or twa, man, 
The Laird o' Blackbyre wad gang through the fire. 

If that wad entice her awa, man. 

The Laird o' Braehead has been on his speed, 
For mair than a towmond or twa, man ; 

The Laird o' the Ford will straught on a board, 
If he canna get her at a', man. 



86 THE TARBOLTON LASSES, 



Then Anna comes in, the pride o' her kin, 

The boast of our bachelors a, man ; 
Sae sonsy and sweet, sae fully complete, 

She steals our affections awa, man. 

If I should detail the pick and the wale 

0' lasses that live here awa, man, 
The fault wad be mine, if they didna shine, 

The sweetest and best o' them a', man. 

I lo'e her mysel, but darena weel tell. 

My poverty keeps me in awe, man. 
For making o' rhymes, and working at times, 

Does little or naething at a', man. 

Yet I wadna choose to let her refuse, 
Nor hae't in her power to say na, man ; 

For though I be poor, unnoticed, obscure, 
My stomach's as proud as them a*, man. 

Though I canna ride in weel-booted pride. 
And flee o'er the hills like a craw, man, 

I can hand up my head with the best o' the breed. 
Though fluttering ever so braw, man. 

My coat and my vest, they are Scotch o* the best, 
O' pairs o' guid breeks I hae twa, man. 

And stockings and pumps to put on my stumps, 
And ne'er a wrang steek in them a', man, 

My sarks they are few, but five o* them new, 
Twal' hundred, as white as the snaw, man, 

A ten -shilling hat, a Holland cravat ; 
There are no mony poets sae braw, man. 



THE HOLY FAIR, 87 



I never had frien's weel stockit in means, 
To leave me a hunder or twa, man ; 

Nae weel-tocher'd aunts, to wait on their drant'j, 
And wish them in hell for it a*, man. 

I never was cannie for hoarding o* money, 

Or claughtin't together at a, man, 
I've little to spend, and naething to lend, 

But deevil a shilling I awe, man. 



THE HOLY FAIR. 
T TPON a simmer Sunday morn, 



! 

■ 

_ When Nature's face is fair, 
j I walked forth to view the corn, 

) And snuff the caller air. 

1 The rising sun owre Galston muirs, 

\ Wi* glorious light was glintin' ; 

The hares were hirplin down the furs. 
The lav'rocks they were chantin' 

Fu* sweet that day. 

As lightsomely I glower' d abroad, 

To see a scene sae gay, 
Three hizzies, early at the road, 

Cam skelpin' up the way ; 
Twa had manteeles o' dolefu' black, 

But ane wi' lyart lining ; 
The third, that gaed a-wee a-back. 

Was in the fashion shining 

Fu' gay that day. 



The twa appear' d like sisters twin, 

In feature, form, and claes ; 
Their visage, wither'd, lang, and thin, 

And sour as ony slaes : 
The third cam up, hap-step-and-lowp, 

As light as ony lambie, 
And wi' a curchie low did stoop, 

As soon as e'er she saw me, 

Fu' kind that day. 

Wi' bonnet aff, quoth I, "Sweet lass, 

I think ye seem to ken me ; 
I'm sure I've seen that bonny face, 

But yet I canna name ye." 
Quo' she, and laughin' as she spak. 

And taks me by the hands, 
" Ye, for my sake, hae gien the feck 

Of a' the ten commands 

A screed some day. 

'* My name is Fun — your crony dear, 

The nearest friend ye hae ; 
And this is Superstition here, 

And that's Hypocrisy. 
I'm gaun to Mauchline holy fair, 

To spend an hour in daffin' ; 
Gin ye'll go there, yon runkled pair, 

We will get famous laughin', 

At them this day." 

Quoth I, '' With a' my heart, I'll do't, 
I'll get my Sunday's sark on. 

And meet you on the holy spot ; 
Faith, we'se hae fine remarkin' 1 '* 



THE HOLY FAIR. 89 



Then I gaed hame at crowdie-time, 

And soon I made me read}^ ; 
For roads were clad, frae side to side, 

Wi' mony a weary body, 

In droves that day. 

Here farmers gash, in ridin* graith, 

Gaed hoddin' by their cottars ; 
There, swankies young, in braw braid claitli. 

Are springin' owre the gutters ; 
The lasses, skelpin' barefit, thrang, 

In silks and scarlet glitter ; 
Wi' sweet-milk cheese, in mony a whang, 

And farls, baked wi' butter, 

Fu' crump that day. 

When by the plate we set our nose, 

Weel heaped up wi' ha'pence, 
A greedy glower Black-bonnet throws, 

And we maun draw our tippence. 
Then in we go to see the show. 

On every side they're gath'rin'. 
Some carrying dails, some chairs and stools, 

And some are busy bleth'rin* 

Right loud that day. 

Here stands a shed to fend the showers. 

And screen our country gentry. 
There Racer Jess, and twa-three whores, 

Are blinkin' at the entry. 
Here sits a raw of tittlin' jades, 

Wi' heaving breast and bare neck, 
And there a batch o' wabster lads, 

Blackguarding frae Kilmarnock, 

For fun this day. 



Here, some are thinkin' on their sins, j 

And some upo' their claes ; 1 

Ane curses feet that fyled his shins, j 

Anither sighs and prays : I 
On this hand sits a chosen swatch, " j 

Wi* screwed-up, grace-proud faces ; j 
On that a set o' chaps at watch, 

Thrang winkin' on the lasses 

To chairs that day. 

Oh, happy is that man and blest, 

Nae wonder that it pride him ! 
Whase ain dear lass, that he likes best, 

Comes clinkin' down beside him ! 
Wi' arm reposed on the chair-back, 

He sweetly does compose him ; 
Which, by degrees, slips round her neck, 

An's loof upon her bosom, 

Unkenn'd that day. 

Now a' the congregation o'er 

Is silent expectation : 
For Moodie speels the holy door, 

Wi* tidings o' damnation. 
Should Hornie, as in ancient days, 

'Mang sons o' God present him. 
The very sight o' Hoodie's face 

To's ain het hame had sent him 

Wi' fright that day. 

Hear how he clears the points o' faith 

Wi' rattlin' and wi' thumpin' ! 
Now meekly calm, now wild in wrath, 

He's stampin' and he's jumpin' ! 



THE HOLY FAIR, 91 



His lengthen'd chin, his turn'd-up snont, 
His eldritch squeal, and gestures, 

Oh, how they fire the heart devout, 
Like cantharidian plasters, 

On sic a day ! 

But, hark ! the tent has changed its voice ! 

There's peace and rest nae langer ; 
For a' the real judges rise, 

They canna sit for anger. 
Smith opens out his cauld harangues 

On practice and on morals ; 
And aff the godly pour in thrangs, 

To gie the jars and barrels 

A lift that day. 

What signifies his barren shine 

Of moral powers and reason ? 
His English style, and gesture fine, 

Are a' clean out o* season. 
Like Socrates or Antonine, 

Or some auld pagan heathen, 
The moral man he does define, 

But ne'er a word o* faith in 

That's right that day. 

In guid time comes an antidote 

Against sic poison'd nostrum ; 
For Peebles, frae the Water-fit, 

Ascends the holy rostrum : 
See, up he's got the Word o' God, 

And meek and mim has view'd it, 
While Common Sense has taen the road, 

And's aff and up the Cowgate, 

Fast, fast, that day. 



THE HOLY FAIR, 



Wee Miller neist the guard relieves, 

And orthodoxy raibles, 
Though iu his heart he weel believes 

And thinks it auld wives' fables : 
But, faith ! the biikie wants a manse, 

So, cannily he hums them ; 
Although his carnal wit and sense 

Like hafflins-ways o'ercomes him 
At times that day. 

Now but and ben the change-house fills 

Wi' yill-caup commentators : 
Here's crying out for bakes and gills, 

And there the pint-stoup clatters ; 
While thick and thrang, and loud and lang, 

Wi' logic and wi' Scripture, 
They raise a din, that, in the end. 

Is like to breed a rupture 

0' wrath that day. 

Leeze me on drink ! it gies us mair 

Than either school or college : 
It kindles wit, it waukens lair, 
It pangs us fou o' knowledge. 
Be't whisky gill, or penny wheep, 

Or ony stronger potion, 
It never fails, on drinking deep, 
\ To kittle up our notion 

\ By night or day. 

s 

\ The lads and lasses, blithely bent, 

\ To mind baith saul and body, 

\ Sit round the table weel content, 

! And steer about the toddy. 



THE HOLY FAIR, 93 



On this ane's dress, and that ane's leuk, 

They're making observations ; 
While some are cozie i' the neuk, 

And forming assignations 

To meet some day. 

But now the Lord's ain trumpet touts, 

Till a* the hills are rarin*, 
And echoes back return the shouts, 

Black Russell is na sparin* ; 
His piercing words, like Highland swords, 

Divide the joints and marrow ; 
His talk 0' hell, whare devils dwell, 

Our vera sauls does harrow 

Wi' fright that day. 

A vast, unbottom'd, boundless pit, 

FilFd fu' 0' lowin' brunstane, 
Whase ragin' flame, and scorch in* heat, 

Wad melt the hardest whunstane ! 
The half-asleep start up wi' fear. 

And think they hear it roarin', 
When presently it does appear 

'Twas but some neibor snorin' 

Asleep that day. 

'Twad be owre lang a tale to tell 

How mony stories past. 
And how they crowded to the yill 

When they were a' dismist : 
How drink gaed round, in cogs and caups. 

Among the forms and benches : 
And cheese and bread, frae women's laps, 

Was dealt about in lunches, 

And dauds that day. 



94 THE HOL V FAIR, 



In comes a gaucie, gash guidwife, 

And sits down by the fire. 
Syne draws her kebbuck and her knife ; 

The lasses they are shyer. 
The auld guidmen, about the grace, 

Frae side to side they bother, 
Till some ane by his bonnet lays, 

And gies them't like a tether, 

Fu' lang that day. 

Waesucks ! for him that gets nae lass, 

Or lasses that hae naething ! 
Sma' need has he to say a grace, 

Or melvie his braw claithing ! 
wives, be mindfu' ance yersel 

How bonny lads ye wanted, 
And dinna, for a kebbuck-heel, 

Let lasses be affronted 

On sic a day ! 

Now Clinkumbell, wi' rattlin' tow, 

Begins to jow and croon ; 
Some swagger harae, the best they dow, 

Some wait the afternoon, 
At slaps the billies halt a blink, 

Till lasses strip their shoon : 
AVi' faith and hope, and love and drink, 

They're a' in famous tune 

For crack that day. 

How mony hearts this day converts 

0' sinners and o' lasses ! 
Their hearts o' stane, gin night, are gane, 

As saft as ony flesli is. 



ON THE DEATH OF A DAUGHTER. 95 



There's some are fou 0* love divine ; 

There's some are fou o' brandy ; 
And mony jobs that day begin 

May end in honghraagandy 

Some ither day. 



ON THE DEATH OF A FAYOURITE DAUGHTER. 

OH, sweet be thy sleep in the land of the grave, 
My dear little angel, for ever ; 
For ever — oh no ! let not man be a slave, 
His hopes from existence to sever. 

Though cold be the clay where thou pillow'st thy head, 
In the dark silent mansions of sorrow, 

The spring shall return to thy low narrow bed, 
Like the beam of the daystar to-morrow. 

The flower-stem shall bloom like thy sweet seraph form, 
Ere the spoiler had nipt thee in blossom ; 

When thou shrunk from the scowl of the loud winter 
storm, 
And nestled thee close to that bosom. 



Oh, still I behold thee, all lovely in death, 

Reclined on the lap of thy mother, 
When the tear trickled bright, when the short stifled 
breath. 

Told how dear ye were aye to each other. 



96 BE A TH AND DR, HORNBOOK. 



My child, thou art gone to the home of thy rest, 
Where suffering no longer can harm ye, 

Where the songs of the good, where the hvmns of the 
blest. 
Through an endless existence shall charm thee. 

While he, thy fond parent, must sighing sojourn 
Through the dire desert regions of sorrow, 

O'er the hope and misfortune of being to mourn, 
And siojh for his life's latest morrow. 



DEATH AND DR. HORNBOOK. 

A TRUE STORY, 

SOME books are lies fra end to end, 
And some great lies were never penn'd : 
E'en ministers, they hae been kenn'd, 

In holy rapture, 
A rousing whid at times to vend, 

And nail't wi' Scripture. 

But this that I am gaun to tell, 
Which lately on a night befell. 
Is just as true's the deil's in hell 

Or Dublin city : 
That e'er he nearer comes oursel 

'S a muckle pity. 

The clachan yill had made me canty, 
I wasna fou, but just had plenty, 



DEA TH AND DR. HORNBOOK, 97 



I stacher'd whyles, but yet took tent aye 
To free the ditches ; 

And hillocks, stanes, and bushes kenn'd aye 
Eras ghaists and witches. 

The rising moon began to glower 
The distant Cumnock hills out-owre : 
To count her horns, wi' a* my power, 

I set my set ; 
But whether she had three or four, 

I couldna tell. 



I was come round about the hill, 
And toddlin' down on Willie's mill, 
Setting my staff wi' a' my skill, 

To keep me sicker : 
Though leeward whiles, against my will, 

I took a bicker. 



I there wi* something did forgather, 

That put me in an eerie swither ; 

An awfu' scythe, out-owre ae shouther, 

Clear-dangling, hang ; 
A three-taed leister on the ither 

Lay large and lang. 

Its stature seem'd lang Scotch ells twa, 
The queerest shape that e'er I saw, 
For fient a wame it had ava ; 

And then its shanks, 
They were as thin, as sharp and sma', 

As cheeks 0' branks. 
G-g 



98 DEATH AND DR, HORNBOOK. 



'* Guid-e*en," quo' I ; ** friend, hae ye been mawin', 
When ither folk are busy sawin' ? " 
It seera'd to mak a kind o' stan', 

But naething spak ; 
At length, says I, ** Friend, whare ye gaun ? 

"Will ye go back ? " 

It spak right howe— *' My name is Death : 
But be na fley'd."— Quoth I, ** Gnid faith, 
Ye're maybe come to stap my breath ; 

But tent me, billie ; 
I red ye weel, tak care o' skaith, 

See, there's a gully 1 " 

*' Guidman," quo he, " put up your whittle, 
I'm no design'd to try its mettle ; 
But if I did, I wad be kittle 

To be mislear'd, 
I wad na mind it, no that spittle 

Out-owre my beard.** 

" Weel, weel," says I, **a bargain be't ; 
Come, gies your hand, and say we're gree't ; 
We'll ease our shanks and tak a seat — 

Come, gies your news ; 
This while ye hae been mony a gate. 

At mony a house." 

/' Ay, ay ! " quo he, and shook his head, 
" It's e'en a lang, lang time indeed 
Sin' I began to nick the thread 

And choke the breath : 
s^olk maun do something for their bread, 
And sae maun Death. 



DEATH AND DR. HORNBOOK. 99 



"Sax thousand years are near hand fled 
Sin' I was to the butchering bred, 
And mony a scheme in vain's been laid, 

To stap or scar me ; 
Till ana Hornbook's ta'en up the trade, 

And faith he'll waur me. 

** Ye ken Jock Hornbook i' the clachan, 
Deil mak his kiiig's-hood in a spleuchan ! 
He's grown sae weel acquaint wi' Buchan 

And ither chaps, 
The weans baud out their fingers laughin'^ 

And pouk my hips. 

*' See, here's a scythe, and there's a dart, 
They hae pierced mony a gallant heart ; 
But Dr. Hornbook, wi* his art 

And cursed skill, 
Has made then baith no worth a f — t, 

Damn'd haet they'll kill. 

** *Twas but yestreen, nae further gaen, 

I threw a noble throw at ane ; 

Wi' less, I'm sure, I've hundreds slain ; 

But deil ma care, 
It just play'd dirl on the bane. 

But did nae mair. 

Hornbook was by, wi' ready art, 
And had sae fortified the part. 
That when I looked to my dart, 

It was sae blunt, 
Fient haet o't wad hae pierced the heart 

0' a kail-runt. 



loo DEATH AND DR. HORNBOOK, 



** I drew my scythe in sic a fury, 
I near-hand cowpit wi' my hurry, 
But yet the bauld apothecary 

Withstood the shook ; 
I might as weel hae tried a quarry 

0' hard wliin rock. 

*' Even them he canna get attended, 
Although their face he ne'er had kenn'd it, 
Just sh — e in a kail-blade and send it, 

As scon's he smells't, 
Baith their disease and what will mend it 

At ance he tells't. 

" xind then a* doctor's saws and whittles, 
or a' dimensions, shapes, and metals, 
A' kinds o' boxes, mugs, and bottles, 

He's sure to hae : 
Their Latin names as fast he rattles 

As ABC. 

' ' Calces o' fossils, earths, and trees ; 
True salmarinum o' the seas ; 
The farina of beans and peas. 

He has't in plenty ; 
Aquafontis, what you please. 

He can content ye. 

*^ Forbye some new uncommon weapons, 

Urinus spiritus of capons ; 

Or mite-horn shavings, filings, scrapings, 

Distill'd per se ; 
Salalkali o' midge-tail clippings, 

And mony mae." 



'* Waes me for Joliuuie Ged's hole nooV* 
Quo' I, ** if that thue news be true ! 
J I is braw calf- ward whare gowaus grew, 

Sae white and bouuy, 
Nae doubt they'll rive it wi' the plew ; 

They'll ruin Johimif ! " 

The creature grain'd an eldritch laugh, 
Aiid says, ''Ye needna yoke tlie pleugh, 
Kirkyards will soon be till'd eneugh, 

Tak ye nae fear : 
They'll a' be trench'd wi' mony a shengb 

In twa-three year. 

" Whare I kill'd ane a fair strae death, 
By loss o' blood or want o' breath, 
This night I'm free to tak my aith, 

That Hornbook's skill 
Has clad a score i' their last claith, 

By drap and pill. 

' ' An honest wabster to his trade, 

Whase wife's twa nieves were scarce weeUhrf; 

Gat tippence- worth to mend her head 

When it was sair ; 
The wife slade cannie to her bed, 

But ne'er spak mair, 

" A country laird had ta'en the batts, 
Or some curmurring in his guts, 
His only son for Hornbook sets, 

And pays him well; 
The lad, for twa guid gimmer-pets, 

Was laird himseL 



** A bonny lass, ye kenn'd her name, 
Some ill-brewn drink had hoved her wame : 
She trusts hersel, to hide the shame, 

In Hornbook's care ; 
Horn sent her aff to her lang hame. 

To hide it there. 

" That's just a swatch o' Hornbook's way ; 
M'hus goes he on from day to day. 
Thus does he poison, kill, and slay, 

An's weel paid for't ; 
Yet stops me o' my lawl'u' prey, 

Wi' his damn'd dirt : 

** But, hark ! I'll tell you of a plot, 
Though dinna ye be speaking o't ; 
I'll nail the self-conceited sot, 

As dead's a herrin' ; 
i^elst time we meet, I'll wad a groat. 

He gets his fairin' ! " 

But just as he began to tell, 
The auld kirk-hammer strak the bell 
Some wee short hour ayont the twal, 

Which raised us baith ; 
1 took the way that pleased mysel. 

And sae did Death. 



THE BRIGS OF A YR. 



THE BRIGS OF AYR. 

INSCRIBED TO JOHN BALLANTYNE, ESQ., AYR. 

THE simple bard, rough at the rustic plough, 
Learuiug his tuneful trade from every bough ; 
The chantiug linnet, or the mellow thrush. 
Hailing the setting sun, sweet, in the green-thorn 

bush ; 
The soaring lark, the perching redbreast shrill, 
Or deep-toned plovers, grey, wild-whistling o'er the hill ; 
Shall he, nurst in the peasant's lowly shed, 
To hardy independence bravely bred, 
By early poverty to hardship steel'd. 
And train'd to aims in stern Misfortune's field- 
Shall he be guilty of their hireling crimes, 
The servile, mercenary Swiss of rhymes ? 
Or labour hard the panegyric close, 
With all the venal soul of dedicating prose % 
No ! though his artless strains he rudely sings, 
And throws his hand uncouthly o'er the strings, 
He glows with all the spirit of the bard, 
Fame, honest fame, his great, his dear reward ! 
Still, if some patron's generous care he trace, 
iSkill'd in the secret, to bestow with grace ; 
When Ballantyne befriends his humble name, 
And hands the rustic stranger up to fame, 
AVith heart-felt throes his grateful bosom swells, 
The godlike bliss, to give, alone excels. 

'Twas when the stacks get on their winter- hap, 
And thcick and rape secure the toil-won crap ; 
Potato- bings are snugged up frae skaith 
U' coming Winter's biting, frosty breath ; 



The bees, rejoicing o'er their summer toils, 
\ TJiiiiumber'd buds' and flowers' delicious spoils, 

i Seal'd up with frugal care in massive waxen piles, 

I Are doom'd by man, that tyrant o'er the weak, 

I The death o' devils, smoor'd wi' brimstone reek -, 

I The thundering guns are heard on every side, 

I The wounded coveys, reeling, scatter wide ; 

I The feather'd field -mates, bound by Nature's tie, 

8ires, mothers, children, in one carnage lie : 
(What warm, poetic heart, but inly bleeds, 
And execrates man's savage, ruthless deeds !) 
Nae mair the flower in field or meadow springs, 
Nae mair the grove with airy concert rings, 
Except, perhaps, the robin's whistling glee, 
Proud o' the height o' some bit half-lang tree : 
The hoary morns precede the sunny days, 
Mild, calm, serene, wide spreads the noontide blaze, 
While thick the gossamer waves wanton in the lays. 



'Twas in that season, when a simple bard, 
Unknown and poor, simplicity's leward, 
Ae night, within the ancient brugh of Ayr, 
By whim inspired, or haply prest wi' care, 
He left his bed, and took his wayward route, 
And down by Simpson's wheel'd the lelt about ; 
(Whether impell'd by all-directing Fate, 
To witness what I after shall narrate ; 
Or penitential pangs for former sins, 
Led him to rove by quondam Meiran Dins ; 
Or whether, rapt in meditation high. 
He wander'd out, he knew not where nor why) 
The drowsy Dungeon clock had number'd two, 
And Wallace Tower had sworn the fact was true ; 



THE BRIGS OF A YR, 105 



The tide-swohi Firth, wi* sullen sounding roar, 

Through the still night dash'd hoarse along the slior*- 

All else was hush'd as Nature's closed e'e : 

The silent moon shone high o'er tower and tree : 

The chilly frost, beneath the silver beam. 

Crept, gently-crustiiig, o'er the glittering stream. 



When, lo ! on either hand the listening bard, 

The clanging sugli of whistling wings is heard ; 

Two dusky forms dart through the midnight air, 

Swift as the gos drives on the wheeling hare ; 

Ane on the Auld Brig his airy shape uprears, 

The ither flutters o'er tlie rising piers : 

Our warlock rhymer instantly descried 

The sprites that owre the Brigs of Ayr preside, 

(That bards are second-sighted is nae joke, 

And ken the lingo of the spiritual folk ; 

Fays, spunkies, kelpies, a', they can explain them., 

And even the very deils they brawly ken them. ) 

Auld Brig appear'd o' ancient Pictish race. 

The very wrinkles Gothic in his face : 

He seem'd as he wi* Time had warstled lang, 

Vet, teughly doure, he bade an unco bang. 

New Brig was buskit in a braw new coat, 

That he at Lon'on frae ane Adams got ; 

In's hand five taper staves as smooth's a bead, 

Wi' virls and whirlygigums at the head. 

The Goth was stalking round with anxious seanh, 

Spying the time-worn flaws in every arch ; 

It chanced his new-come neibor took his e'e, 

And e'en a vex'd and angry heart had he ! 

Wi* thieveless sneer to see his modish mien, 

Me, down the water, gies him this guid e'en : — 



io6 THE BRIGS OF A YR. 



AULD BRIG. 

I doubt na, frien', ye'll think ye're nae shee]>sliank, 
Alice ye were streekit owre fiae bank to bank ! 
But gin ye be a brig as auld as me — 
Tliougl), faith, that date I doubt ye'll never see— 
There'll be, if that date come, I'll wad a boddle, 
Some fewer whigmaleeries in your noddle. 

NEW BRIG. 

Auld Vandal, ye but show your little meiise, 
Just much about it, wi' your scanty sense ; 
Will your poor narrow footpath of a street — 
Where twa wheelbarrows tremble when they meet— • 
Your ruin'd, formless bulk o' staue and lime, 
Compare wi* bonny brigs o' modern time ? 
There's men o' taste would tak the Ducat Stream, 
Though they should cast the very sark and swim, 
Kre they would grate their feelings wi* the view 
0" sic an ugly Gothic hulk as you. 

AULD BRIG. 

Conceited gowk ! puli'd up wi* windy pride ! 
I'll is mony a year I've stood the Hood and tide ; 
And though wi' crazy eild I'm sair foriairu, 
I'll be a brig when ye're a shapeless cairn ! 
As yet ye little ken about the matter. 
But twa-three winters will inform ye better. 
When heavy, dark, continued, a*-day rains, 
Wi' deepening deluges o'erflow the plains ; 
When from the hills where springs the brawling Coil, 
Or stately Lugar's mossy fountains boil, 
Or where the Greenock winds his moorland course. 
Or haunted Garpal draws his feeble source, 



Aroused by blustering winds and spotting thowes, 
111 inouy a torrent down his snaw-broo rowes ; 
While crashing ice, borne on the roaring spate, 
Sweeps dams, and mills, and brigs, a' to the gate ; 
And from Glenbuck, down to the Ratton-key, 
Auld Ayr is just one lengthen'd tumbling sea — 
Then down ye'll hurl, deil nor ye never rise ! 
And dash the gumlie jaups up to the pouring skies. 
A lesson sadly teaching, to your cost, 
That Architecture's noble art is lost ! 

NEW BRIG. 

Fine Architecture, trowth, I needs must say o't, 
The Lord be thankit that we've tint the gate o't I 
Gaunt, ghastly, ghaist-alluring edifices, 
Hanging, with threatening jut, like precipices j 
O'erarching, mouldy, gloom-inspiring coves, 
Supporting roofs fantastic, stony groves ; 
"Windows and doors, in nameless sculpture drest, 
With order, symmetry, or taste unblest ; 
Forms like some* bedlam statuary's dream, 
The crazed creations of misguided whim ; 
Forms might be worshipp'd on the bended kn^e, 
And still the second dread command be free, 
Their likeness is not found on earth, in air, or sea. 
Mansions that would disgrace the building taste 
Of any mason reptile, bird, or beast ; 
Fit only for a doited monkish race. 
Or frosty maids forsworn the dear embrace ; 
Or cuifs of later times wha held the notion 
That sullen gloom was sterling true devotion ; 
Fancies that our guid brugh denies protection ! 
And soon may they expire, unblessed with resurrection 



AULD BRIG. 

ye, my dear-remember'd ancient yealings, 
Were ye but here to share my wounded feeliij|^s ! 
Ye worthy proveses, and mony a bailie, 
AVlia in the paths o' righteousness did toil aye ; 
Ye dainty deacons, and ye douce conveeners, 
'i'o whom our moderns are but causey-cleaners I 
Y^'e godly councils wha hae blest this town ; 
Ye godly brethren o' the sacred gown, 
Wha meekly gac your hurdles to the smiters ; 
And (what would now be strange) ye godly writers ; 
A' ye douce folk I've borne aboon the broo, 
Were ye but here, what would ye say or do ! 
How would your spirits groan in deep vexation 
To see each melancholy alteration ; 
And, agonising, curse the time and place 
When ye begat the base, degenerate race ! 
]S"ae langer reverend men, their country's glory, 
In plain braid Scots hold forth a plain braid story ! 
Xae langer thrifty citizens and douce. 
Meet owre a pint, or in the council -'house ; 
But staumrel, corky-headed, graceless gentry, 
The herryment and ruin of the country ; 
Men three parts made by tailors and by barbers, 
Wha waste your weel-hain'd gear on damn'd new brigs 
and harbours ! 

NEW BKIG. 

Now baud you there ! for faith ye've said enough, 
And muckle mair than ye can mak to through ; 
That's aye a string auld doited grey-beards harp on, 
A topic for their peevishness to carp on. 
As for your priesthood, I shall say but little. 
Corbies and clergy are a shot right kittle : 



THE BRIGS OF A YR. 109 



But, nnder favour o' your langer beard, 

Abuse o' magistrates might weel be spared : 

To liken them to your auld-warld squad, 

I must needs say comparisons are odd. 

In Ayr, wag-wits nae mair can hae a handle 

To mouth *'a citizen," a terra o' scandal ; 

Nae mair the council waddles down the street, 

In all the pomp of ignorant conceit ; 

No difference but bulkiest or tallest, 

With comfortable dulness in for ballast ; 

Nor shoals nor currents need a pilot's caution, 

For regularly slow, they only witness motion ; 

Men wha grew wise priggin' owre hops and raisins, 

Or gather'd liberal views in bonds and seisins. 

If haply Knowledge, on a random tramp, 

Had shored them wi' a glimmer of his lamp, 

And would to Common Sense for once betray'd thorn. 

Plain, dull Stupidity stept kindly in to aid them. 



What further clishmaclaver might been said, 
What bloody war, if sprites had blood to shed, 
No man can tell ; but all before their sight, 
A fairy train a] psar'd in order bright : 
Ad own the gliti ering stream they featly danced ; 
Bright to tlie moon their various dresses glanced : 
They footed o'er the watery glass so neat. 
The infant ice scarce bent beneath their feet ; 
AVhile arts of minstrelsy among them rung, 
And soul-ennobling bards heroic ditties sung. 
Oh, had M'Lachlan, thairm -inspiring sage, 
Been there to hear this heavenly band engage, 
When through his dear strathspeys they bore with 
Highland rage ; 



I lo THE BRIGS OF A YR. 



Or when they struck old Scotia's melting airs, 

The lover's raptured joys or bleeding cares ; 

How would his Highland lug been nobler fired, 

And even his matchless hand with finer touch inspired ! 

No guess could tell what instrument appear'd, 

But all the soul of Music's self was heard ; 

Harmonious concert rung in every part. 

While simple melody pour'd moving on the heart. 

The Genius of the stream in front appears, 
A venerable chief advanced in years ; 
His hoary head with water-lilies crown'd, 
His manly leg with garter-tangle bound. 
Next came the loveliest pair in all the ring, 
Sweet Female Beauty hand in hand with Spring ; 
Then, crown'd with flowery hay, came Rural Joy, 
And Summer, with his fervid-beaming eye : 
All-cheering Plenty, with her flowing horn, 
Led yellow Autumn, wreathed with nodding corn ; 
Then Winter's time-bleached locks did hoary show, 
By Hospitality with cloudless brow. 
Next follow'd Courage, with his martial stride, 
From where the Feal wild-woody coverts hide ; 
Benevolence, with mild, benignant air, 
A female form came from the towers of Stair : 
Learning and Worth in equal measures trode 
From sim[)le Catrine, their long-loved abode : 
Last, white-robed Peace, crowned with a hazel wreath, 
To rustic Agriculture did bequeath 
The broken iron instruments of death ; 
At sight of whom our sprites forgat their kindling 
wrath. 



THE ORDINATION. iii 



THE ORDIKATION. 

KILMARNOCK wabsters, fidge and claw, 
And pour your creeshie nations ; 
And ye who leather rax and draw, 

Of a* denominations, 
Swaith to the Laigh Kirk, ane and a', 

And there tak up your stations ; 
Then aff to Begbie's in a raw. 
And pour divine libations 

For joy this day. 

Curst Common Sense, that imp o' hell, 

Cam in wi' Maggie Lauder ; 
But Oliphant aft made her yell, 

And Russell sair misca'd her ; 
This day Mackinlay taks the flail, 

And he's the boy will blaud her ! 
He'll clap a shangan on her tail, 

And set the bairns to daud her 

Wi' dirt this day. 



Mak haste and turn king David owre, 

And lilt wi' holy clangor ; 
0' double verse come gie us four, 

And skirl up the Bangor : 
This day the Kiik kicks up a stoure, 

Nae mair the knaves shall wrang her, 
For Heresy is in her power, 

And gloriously she'll whang her 
Wi' pith this day. 



THE ORDINATION, 



Come, let a proper text be read, 

And tou(!h it aff wi' vigour, 
How graceless Ham leugh at his dad, 

Which made Canaan a nigger ; 
Or Phinehas drove the murdering blade, 

Wi' whore-abhorring rigour ; 
Or Zipporah, the scauldiu' jade, 

Was like a bluidy tiger 

r the inn that day. 

There, try his mettle on the creed, 

And bind him down wi' caution, 
That stipend is a carnal weed 

He taks but for the fashion ; 
And gie him owre the flock to feed, 

And punish each transgression ; 
Especial, rams that cross the breed, 

Gie them suflScient threshin'. 

Spare them nae day. 

Now, auld Kilmarnock, cock thy tail, 

And toss thy horns fu' canty ; 
Nae mair thou'lt rowte out-owre the dale. 

Because thy pasture's scanty ; 
For lapfu's large o' gospel kail 

Shall fill thy crib in plenty, 
And runts o' grace the pick and wale. 

No gien by way o* dainty, 
But ilka day. 

Na3 mair by Babel's streams we'll weep, 

To think upon our Zion ; 
And hing our fiddles up to sleep, 

Like baby-clouts a-dryin' ; 



THE ORDINATION, 113 



Come, screw the pegs, wi' tunefu' cheep, 
And o'er the thairms be tryin' ; 

Oh, rare to see our elbucks wheep, 
And a' like lamb-tails flyin' 

Fu' fast this day ! 



Lang, Patronage, wi' rod o' airn, 

Has shored the Kirk's undoin', 
As lately Fenwick, sair forfairn, 

Has proven to its ruin ; 
Our patron, honest man ! Glen cairn, 

He saw mischief was brewin' ; 
And, like a godly elect bairn, 

He's waled us out a true ane. 

And sound this day. 



Now, Robinson, harangue nae mair, 

But stick your gab for ever : 
Or try the wicked town of Ayr, 

For there they'll think you clever I 
Or, nae reflection on your lear. 

Ye may commence a shaver ; 
Or to the Netherton repair. 

And turn a carpet-weaver 

Aff hand this day. 



Mutrie and you were just a match, 
We never had sic twa drones : 

Auld Hornie did the Laigh Kirk watcli, 
Just like a winkin* baudrons : 
H-h 



It4 THE ORDINATION. 



And aye lie catch' d the tither wretch, 
To fry t iiem in his caudrons : 

But now his honour maun detach, 
Wi' a' his brimstone squadrons, 
Fast, fast this day. 

See, see auld Orthodoxy's faes 

She's swingein' through the city ; 
Hark, how the nine-tail'd cat she plays ! 

I vow its unco pretty : 
There, Learning, with his Greekish face, 

GruFits out some Latin ditty ; 
And Common Sense is gaun, she says, 

To mak to Jamie Beattie 

Her plaint this day. 

But there's Morality hirasel, 

Embracing all opinions ; 
Hear how he gies the tither yell, 

Between his twa companions ; 
See how she peels the skin and fell. 

As ane were peelin' onions ! 
Now there — they're packed aff to hell, 

And banish'd our dominions 

Henceforth this day. 

happy day ! rejoice, rejoice ! 

Come bouse about the porter ! 
Morality's demure decoys 

Shall here nae mair find quarter ! 
Mackinlay, Russell, are the boys 

That Heresy can torture, 
They'll gie her on a rape a ho3^se. 

And cowe her measure shorter 

By the head some day. 



CoiJie, bring tlie tither mutcbkin in, 

And here's, for a conclusion, 
To every New-Light mother's son, 

From this time forth. Confusion : 
If mair they deave us wi' their din, 

Oi- patronage intrusion, 
We'll light a spunk, and, every skin, 

We'll rin them aft" in fusion, 

Like oil some day. 



SKETCH. 

INSCRIBED TO THE RIGHT HON. C. J. FOX. 

HOW wisdom and folly meet, mix, and in]it(j ! 
How virtue and vice blend their black and tliei 
white ; 
How genius, the illustrious father of fiction, 
Confounds rule and law, reconciles contradiction — 
I sing : if these mortals, the critics, should bustle, 
I care not, not I — let the critics go whistle ! 

But now for a patron, whose name and whose glory 
At once may illustrate and honour my story. 

Thou first of our orators, first of our wits ; 
Yet whose parts and acquirements seem mere lucky hits 
With knowledge so vast, and with judgment so strong, 
No man with the half of 'em e'er went far wrong ; 
AVitli ])assions so potent, and fancies so bright. 
No man with the half of 'em e'er went quite right ;— 
A sorry, poor misbegot son of the Iiluses, 
For using the name ofi'ers fifty excuses. 



ii6 SKETCH. 



Good Lord, what is man ? for as simple he looks, 

Do but try to develop his hooks and his crooks ; 

With his depths and his shallows, his good and his evil ; 

All in all he's a problem must puzzle the devil. 

On his one ruling passion Sir Pope hugely labours, 

That, like the old Hebrew walking-switch, eats up its 

neighbours. 
Mankind are his show-box — a friend, would you know 

him? 
Pull the string, ruling passion the picture will show 

him. 
What pity, in rearing so beauteous a system, 
One trifling particular truth should have miss'd him ; 
For, s}>ite of his fine theoretic positions, 
Mankind is a science defies definitions. 



Some sort all our qualities each to its tribe, 

And think human nature they truly describe ; 

Have you found this, or t'other? there's more in the 

wind, 
As by one drunken fellow his comrades you'll find. 
But such is the flaw, or the depth of the plan,. 
In the make of that wonderful creature call'd mau, 
No two virtues, whatever relation they claim. 
Nor even two difi'erent shades of the same, 
Though like as was ever twin brother to brother, 
Possessing the one shall imply you've the other. 

But truce with abstraction, and truce with a Muse, 
Whose rhymes you'll perhaps, sir, ne'er deign to peruse ; 
Will you leave your justings, your jars, and your 

quarrels, 
Contending with Billy for proud-nodding laurels ? 



My much-hoTiour'd patron, believe your poor poet, 
Your courage much more than your prudence you 

show it ; 
In vain with Squire Billy for laurels you struggle, 
He'll have them by fair trade, if not, he will smuggle ; 
Not cabinets even of kings would conceal 'em, 
He'd up the back stairs, and by God he would steal *em. 
Then feats like Squire Billy's you ne'er can achieve *em. 
It is not, outdo him, the task is out-thieve him. 



THE CALF. 

TO THE REV. MR. JAMES STEVEN. 

RIGHT, sir ! your text I'll prove it true, 
Though heretics may laugh ; 
For instance ; there's yoursel just now, 
God knows, an unco calf ! 

And should some patron be so kind 

As bless you wi' a kirk, 
I doubt ua, sir, but then we'll find 

Ye' re still as great a stirk. 

But if the lover's raptured hour 

Shall ever be your lot. 
Forbid it, every heavenly power, 

You e'er should be a stot ! 

Though, when some kind connubial dear 

Your but-and-ben adorns, 
The like has been that you may wear 

A noble head of horns. 



I 

r ii8 STANZAS TO CLARINDA. 



And in your lug, most reverend James, 

To hear you roar and rowte, 
Few men o' sense will doubt your claims 

To rank amang the nowte. 

And when ye're nuniber'd wi' the dead, 

Below a grassy hillock, 
Wi' justice they may mark your head— - 

'' Here lies a famous bullock 1" 



TO CLARINDA. 

ON THE poet's LEAVING EDINBURaH, 

CLARINDA, mistress of my soul, 
The measured time is run ! 
The wretch beneath the dreary pole 
So marks his latest sun. 

To what dark cave of frozen night 

Shall poor Sylvander hie ? 
Dej)rived of thee, his life and light, 

Tlie sun of all his joy ! 

We part — but, by these precious drops 

That fill thy lovely eyes ! 
No other light shall guide my steps 

Till thy bright beams arise. 

She, the fair sun of all her sex, 

Has blest my glorious day ; 
And shall a glimmering planet fix 

My worship to its ray f 



STANZAS TO CLARhXDA, 119 



TO CLARINDA. 

WITH A PRESENT OF A PAIE OF DRINKING-GLASSES. 

FAIR empress of the poet's soul, 
And queen of poetesses ; 
Clariuda, take this little boon, 
This humble pair of glasses. 

And fill them high with generous juice, 

As generous as j^our mind ; 
And pledge me in the generous toast — 

" The whole of humankind ! " 

** To those who love us ! " — second fill ; 

But not to those whom we love : 
Lest we love those who love not us ! 

A third — " To thee and me, love I '* 

Long may we live ! long may we love ! 

And long may we be happy ! 
And may we novcr want a glass 

Well cliarged with generous nappy ! 



TO CLARINDA. 

BEFORE I saw Clarinda's face, 
My heart was blitlu^ ainl gay, 
Free as the wiuil, or featlicr'd race 
That hop from spray to spray. 



STANZAS TO CLARINDA. 



But now dejected I appear, 

Clarinda proves unkind ; 
I, sighing, drop the silent tear, 

But no relief can find. 

Ah, though my looks betray, 

I envy your success ; 
Yet love to friendship shall give way, 

I cannot wish it less. 

In plaintive notes my tale rehearses 
When I the fair have found ; 

On every tree appear ray verses 
That to her praise resound. 

But she, ungrateful, shuns ray sight, 

My faithful love disdains, 
My vows and tears her scorn excite— 

Another happy reigns. 



TO CLARINDA. 

" T BURN, I burn, as when through ripen'd corn, 

X By driving winds, the crackling flames are borne ! " 
Now maddening, wild, I curse that fatal night ; 
Now bless the hour which charm'd my guilty sight. 
In vain the laws their feeble force oppose ; \ 

Ohain'd at his feet they groan. Love's vanquish'd foes : 
In vain Religion meets my shrinking eye ; 
I dare not combat — but I turn and fly ; 
Conscience in vain upbraids the unhallow'd lire ; 
Love grasps its scorpions — stifled they expire ; 




Reason drops headlong from his sacred throne, 
Your dear idea reigns, and reigns alone : 
Each thought intoxicated homage yields, 
And riots wanton in forbidden fields ! 

By all on high adoring mortals know ! 

By all the conscious villain fears below ! 

By your dear self ! — the last great oath I swear — 

Nor life nor soul was ever half so dear ! 



ADDRESS TO THE DEIL. 

OTHOU ! whatever title suit thee, 
Auld Hornie, Satan, Nick, or Clootie, 
Wha in yon cavern grim and sootie. 

Closed under hatches, 
Spairges about the brunstane cootie, 

To scaud poor wretches I 

Hear me, auld Hangie, for a wee, 
And let poor damnM bodies be ; 
I'm sure sma' pleasure it can gie 

E'en to a deil, 
To skelp and scaud poor dogs like me, 

And hear us squeel ! 

Great is thy power, and great thy fame ; 

Far kenn'd and noted is thy name : 

And though yon lowin' heugh's thy hame, 

Thou travels far : 
And, faith ! thou's neither lag nor lame, 

Nor blate nor scaur. 



Whyles ranging like a roaring lion 
For pre}^ sl holes and corners trj^in' : 
Whyles on the stror.g-wing'd tempest flyln', 

Tirlin' the kirks ; 
Whyles in the human bosom pryin', 

Unseen thoa iurks. 

I've heard my reverend grannie say, 
In lanely glens ye like to stray : 
Or where auld ruin'd castles, grey, 

Nod to the moon, 
Ye fright the nightly wanderer's way 

Wi* eldritch croon. 

When twilight did my grannie summon, 
To say her prayers, douce, honest woman ! 
Aft yont the dike she's heard you bummin', 

Wi' eerie drone ; 
Or, rustlin, through the boortries coiuin', 

Wi' heavy groan. 

Ae dreary, windy, winter night, 

Tlie stars shot down wi' sklentiu' light, 

Wi' you, mysel, I gat a fright 

Ayont the lougli ; 
Ye, like a rash-bush, stood in sight, 

Wi' waving sough. 

The cudgel in my nieve did shake, 
Each bristled hair stood like a stake. 
When wi' an eldritch stoor, quaick, quaick, 

Amang the springs, 
Awa' ye sqnatter'd, like a drake, 

Ou whistlin' wings. 



ADDRESS TO THE DETL, 123 



When thowes dissolve the snawy lioord, 
And float the jinglin' icy-boord, 
Then water-kelpies haunt the loord, 

By your direction ; 
And 'nighted travellers are allured 

To their destruction. 

And aft your moss- traversing spunkies 
Decoy the wight that late and drunk is : 
The bleezin', curst, mischievous monkeys 

Delude his eyes, 
Till in some miry slough he sunk is, 

Ne'er mair to rise. 

Let warlocks grim, and wither'd hags, 
Tell how wi' you, on ragweed nags, 
They skim the muirs and dizzy crags, 

Wi' wicked speed ; 
And in kirkyards renew their leagues 

Owre howkit dead. 

Thence countra wives, wi' toil and pain, 
May plunge and plunge the kirn in vain : 
For, oh ! the yellow treasure's taen 

By witching skill ; 
And dawtit twal-pint hawkie's gaen 

As yell's the bill. 

Thence mystic knots mak great abuse 

On young guidmen, fond, keen, and crouse ; 

Whr.n the best wark-lume i' the house. 

By ran trip wit, 
Is instant made no wortli a louse, 

Just at the bit. 



124 ADDRESS TO THE DEIL. 



When mason's mystic word and grip 
In storms and tempests raise you up, 
Some cock or cat your rage maun stop, 

Or, strange to tell ! 
The youngest brother ye wad whip 

Aff straught to hell I 

Lang syne, in Eden's bonny yard. 
When youth fu' lovers first were pair'd, 
And all the soul of love they shared, 

The raptured hour, 
Sweet on the fragrant flowery sward, 

In shady bower. 

Then you, ye auld sneck-drawing dog ! 

Ye came to Paradise incog,, 

And play'd on man a cursed brogue, 

(Black be your fa' !) 
And gied the infant warld a shog, 

'Maist ruin'd a'. 

D'ye mind that day, when in a bizz, 
Wi' reekit duds, and reestit gizz, 
Ye did present your smoutie phiz 

'Mang better folk, 
And sklented on the man of Uzz 

Your spitefu' joke ? 

And how ye gat him i' your thrall, 
And brak him out o' house and hall, 
While scabs and blotches did him gall, 

Wi' bitter claw, 
And lowsed his ill-tongued, wicked scrawl, 

Was warst ava ? 



LINES. 



125 



V 



But a' your doings to rehearse, 
Your wily snares and fechtin' fierce, 
Sin' that day Michael did you pierce, 

Down to this time, 
Wad ding a Lallan tongue or Erse, 

In prose or rhyme. 

And now, auld Cloots, I ken ye're thinkin 
A certain Bardie's rantin*, drinkin*. 
Some luckless hour will send him linkin' 

To your black pit ; 
But, faith, he'll turn a corner jinkin', 

And cheat you yet. 

But, fare you weel, auld Nickie-ben ! 
Ohj,\vad ye tak a thought and men' ! 
Ye aiblins might — I dinna ken — 

Still hae a stake— 
I'm wae to think upo' yon den, 

Even for your sake \ 



LINES 



WRITTEN TO A GENTLEMAN WHO HAD SENT HIM A 
NEWSPAPER,, AND OFFERED TO CONTINUE IT FREE 
OF EXPENSE. 



KIND sir, I've read your paper through, 
And, faith, to me 'twas really new ! 
How guesa'd ye, sir, what maist I wanted ? 
This mony a day I've graa'd and gaunted 



126 LINES, 



To ken wliat French mischief was brewin', 

Or what the drumlie Dutch were doin' ; 

That vile doup-skelper, Emperor Joseph, 

If Yenus yet had got his nose off ; 

Or how the coUieshangie works 

At ween the Russians and the Turks ; 

Or if the Swede, before he halt, 

Would play anither Charles the Twalt : 

If Denmark, anybody spak o't ; 

Or Poland, wha had now the tack o't ; 

How cut-throat Prussian blades were hingin' 

How libbet Italy was singin' ; 

If Spaniards, Portuguese, or Swiss 

Weie sayin' or takin' aught amiss : 

Or how our merry lads at hame. 

In Britain's court, kept up the game : 

How royal George, the Lord leuk o'er him ! 

Was managing St. Stephen's quorum ; 

If Sleekit Chatham Will was livin', 

Or g]aikit Charlie got his nieve in ; 

How Daddie Burke the plea was cookin', 

If Warren Hastings' neck was yeukin' ; 

How cesses, stents, and fees were rax'd, 

Or if bare a — s yet were tax'd ; 

The news o* princes, dukes, and earls, 

Pimp8, sharpers, bawds, and opera girls ; 

If tliat daft buckie, Geordie Wales, 

Was threshin* still at hizzies' tails ; 

Or if he was grown oughtlins douser, 

And no a perfect kintra cooser. 

A' this and mair I never heard of, 

And but for you I might despair'd of. 

So grate fu', back your news I send you. 

And pray, a' guid things may attend you ! 



THE DEATH OF POOR MAILIE. 127 



TO A KISS. 

HUMID seal of soft affections, 
Tenderest pledge of future bliss, 
Dearest tie of youug connexions, 
Love's first snowdrop, virgin kiss ! 

Speaking silence, dumb confession. 
Passion's birth, and infant's play, 

Dove-like fondness, chaste concession, 
Glowing dawn of brigliter day. 

Sorrowing joy, adieu's last action, 

When lingering lips no more must join. 

What words can ever speak affection 
So thrilling and sincere as thine 1 



THE DEATH AND DYING WORDS OF POOR 
MAILIE, 

THE author's only PET YOWE. 

AS Mailie and her lambs thegither 
Was ae day nibbling on the tether. 
Upon her cloot she coost a hitch, 
And owre she warsled in the ditch : 
There, groaning, dying, she did lie, 
When Hughoc he cam doytin' by. 
Wi' glowring een, and lifted ban's, 
Poor Hughoc like a statue stan's ; 
He saw her da3^s were near-hand ended, 
But, waes my heart ! he couldna mend it I 



He gaped wide, but naething spak — 
At length poor Mailie silence brak : — 

" thou, whase lamentable face 
Appears to mourn my woefu' case ! 
My dying words attentive hear, 
And bear them to my master dear. 

*' Tell him, if e'er again he keep 
As muckle gear as buy a sheep, 
Oh, bid him never tie them mair 
Wi' wicked strings o' hemp or hair 1 
But ca' them out to park or hill, 
And let them wander at tlieir will ; 
So may his flock increase, and grow 
To scores o' lambs, and packs o' woo' ! 

** Tell him he was a master kin', 
And aye was guid to me and mine ; 
And now my dying charge I gie him — 
My helpless lambs I trust them wi' him. 

** Oh, bid him save their harmless lives 
Frae dogs, and tods, and butchers' knives ! 
But gie them guid cow-milk their fill, 
Till they be fit to fend themsel : 
And tent them duly, e'en and morn, 
Wi' teats o' hay, and ripps o' corn. 

*' And may they never learn the gaets 
Of ither vile, wanrestfu' pets ! 
To slink through slaps, and reave and steal 
At stacks o' peas or stocks o' kail. 
So may they, like their great forbears. 
For mony a year come through the shears : 
So wives will gie them bits o' bread, 
And bairns greet for them when they're dead. 

** My poor toop-lamb, my son and heir, 
Oh, bid him breed him up wi' care ] 



And if he live to be a beast, 
To pit some bavins in bis breast ! 
And warn him, what I winna name, 
To stay content wi' yowes at hame : 
And no to rin and wear his clouts, 
Like ither menseless, graceless brutes. 

** And neist my yowie, silly thing, 
Guid keep thee frae a tether string I 
Oh, may thou ne'er forgather up 
Wi' ony blastit, moorland toop. 
But aye keep mind to moop and mell 
Wi' sheep o* credit like thysel ! 

** And now. my bairns, wi* my last breath i 

I lea'e my blessin' wi' you baith : i 

And when you think upo* your mither, g 

Mind to be kin' to ane anither. | 

''Now, honest Hughoo, dinna fail 
To tell my master a' my tale ; 
And bid him burn this cursM tether, 
And, for thy pains, thou's get my blether." 
This said, poor Mailie turn'd her head, 
And closed her een amang the dead. 



THE ELEGY. 

LAMENT in rhyme, lament in prose, 
Wi' saut tears trickling down your nose ; 
Our bardie's fate is at a close. 
Past a' remead ; 
The last sad cape-stane of his woes ; 
Poor Mailie's dead I 
I-i 



130 THE ELEGY, 



It's no the loss o' wad's gear, 
That could sae bitter draw the tear, 
Or mak our bardie, dovvie, wear 

The mourning weed : 
He's lost a friend and neibor dear 

In Mailie dead. 

Through a' the toiin she trotted by him ; 
A lang half-mile she could dtisciy him ; 
Wi' kindly bleat, when she did spy him, 

She ran wi* speed : 
A friend mair faithfu' ne'er cam nigh him 

Than Mailie dead. 

I wat she was a sheep o' sense, 
And could behave hersel wi' mense : 
I'll say't, she never brak a fence 

Through thievish greed. 
Our bardie, lanely, keeps the spence 

Sin' Mailie's dead. 

Or, if he wanders up the howe. 

Her living image in her yowe 

Comes bleating to liim, owre the kuowe, 

For bits o' bread ; 
And down the briny pearls rowe 

For Mailie dead. 

She was nae get o' moorland tips, 

Wi' tawted ket, and hairy hips ; 

For her forbears were brought in ships 

Frae yont the Tweed : 
A bonnier fleesh ne'er cross'd the clips 

Than Mailie dead. 



EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH. 131 



Wae worth the man wha first did shape 
That vile, wanchancie thing — a rape ! 
It makes guid fellows girn and gape, 

Wi' chokin* dread ; 
And Robin's bonnet wave wi' crape, 

For Mailie dead. 

Oh, a' ye bards on bonny Doon ! 
And wha on Ayr your chanters tune ! 
Come, join the melanchoiious croon 

0* Kobin's reed ! 
His heart will never get aboon 

His Mailie dead. 



EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH. 

DEAR SMITH, the sleest, paukie thic' 
That e'er attempted stealth or rief, 
Ye surely hae some warlock breef 
Owre human hearts ; 
For ne*er a bosom yet was prief 
Against your arts. 

For me, I swear by sun and moon. 
And every star that blinks aboon, 
Ye've cost me twenty pair 0' shoon 

Just gaun to see you ; 
And every itlier pair that's done, 

Mair ta'en I'm wi' you. 



132 EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH. 



That auld capricious carlin, Nature, 
To mak ameuds for scrimpit stature, 
She's turned you aif, a human creature 

On her first plan ; 
And in her freaks, on every feature 

She's wrote, *' The Man." 

Just now I've ta'en the fit o' rhyme, 
My barmie noddle's working prime, 
My fancy yerkit up sublime 

Wi* hasty summon : 
Hae ye a leisure moment's time 

To hear what's comin' T 

Some rhyme a neibor's name to lash ; 

Some rhyme (vain thought ! ) for needfu' cash ; 

Some rhyme to court the country clash. 

And raise a din ; 
For me, an aim I never fash ; 

I rhyme for fun. 

The star that rules my luckless lot 

Has fated me the russet coat. 

And damn'd my fortune to the groat ; 

But in requit. 
Has blest me wi' a random shot 

0' country wit. 

This while my notion's ta'en a sklent. 
To try my fate in guid black prent ; 
But still, the mair I'm that way bent, 

Something cries, *' Hoolie I 
I rede you, honest man, tak tent. 

Yell shaw your folly. 



EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH. 133 « 



" There's itlier poets much your betters, 
Far seen in Greek, deep men o' letters, 
Hae thought they had insured their debtors 

A* future ages ; 
Now moths deform in shapeless tatters 

Their unknown pages." 

Then fareweel hopes o' laurel-boughs, 
To garland my poetic brows ! 
Henceforth Fll rove where busy ploughs 

Are whistling thrang. 
And teach the lanely heights and howes 

My rustic sang. 

I'll wander on, with tentless heed 
How never-halting moments speed, 
Till Fate shall snap the brittle thread ; 

Then, all unknown, 
I'll lay me with the inglorious dead, 

Forgot and gone ! 

But why o' death begin a tale ? 

Just now we're living sound and halo, 

Then top and maintop crowd the sail, 

Heave Care owre side ! 
And large, before Enjoyment's gale. 

Let's tak the tide. 

This life, sae far's I understand, 

Is a' enchanted fairy-land. 

Where Pleasure is the magic wand. 

That, wielded right, 
Make hours like minutes, hand in hand, 

Dance by fu' light. 



134 EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH, 



The magic wand then let us wiekl ; 
For, ance that five-and-forty's speel'd, 
See, crazy, weary, joyless Eild, 

Wi' wrinkled face, 
Comes hostin', hirplin', owre the field, 

Wi' creepin* pace. 

When ance life*s day draws near the gloamin', 
Then fareweel vacant careless roamin' ; 
And fareweel cheerfu' tankards fomyiin', 

And social noise ; 
And fareweel, dear deluding woman ! 

The joy of joys ! 

Life ! how pleasant is thy morning, 
Young Fancy's rays the hills adorning ! 
Cold-pausing Caution's lesson scorning. 

We frisk away, 
Like schoolboys, at the expected warning, 

To joy and play. 

We wander there, we wander here, 
We eye the rose upon the brier, 
Unmindful that the thorn is near, 

Among the leaves ; 
And though the puny wound appear. 

Short while it grieves. 

Some, lucky, find a flowery spot, 
For which they never toil'd or swat ; 
They drink the sweet and eat the. fat, 

But care or pain ; 
And, haply, eye the barren hut 

With high disdain. 



EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH, 135 



With steady aim some fortunu chase ; 

Keen hope does every sinew brace ; 

Through fair, through foul, they urge the race, 

And seize the prey : 
Then cannie, in some cozie place, 

They close the day. 

And others, like your humble servan'. 
Poor wights ! nae rules nor roads observin*, 
To right or left, eternal swervin*, 

They zig-zag on ; 
Till curst with age, obscure and starvin', 

They aft en groan. 

Alas ! what bitter toil and straining — 
But truce with peevish, poor complaining ! 
Is Fortune's fickle Luna waning ? 

E'en let her gang ! 
Beneath what light she has remaining, 

Let's sing our sang. 

My pen I here fling to the door, 

And kneel, '* Ye powers ! " and warm implore, 

'* Though I should wander Terra o'er, 

In all her climes. 
Grant me but this, I ask no more, 

Aye rowth 0' rhymes, 

** Gie dreeping roasts to country lairds, 
Till icicles hing frae their beards ; 
Gie fine braw claes to fine life-guards, 

And maids of honour ; 
And yill and whisky gie to cairds, 

Until they sconuer. 



136 EPISTLE TO JAMES SMITH. 



** A title, Dempster merits it ; 

A garter gie to Willie Pitt ; 

Gie wealth to some be-ledger'd cit, 

In cent, per cent. ; 
But gie me real, sterling wit, 

And I'm content. 

** While ye are pleased to keep me hale, 
I'll sit down o'er my scanty meal, 
Be't water-brose, or muslin-kail, 

Wi' cheerfu' face. 
As lang's the Muses dinna fail 

To say the grace.'* 

An anxious e'e I never throws 
Bebint my lug or by my nose ; 
I jouk beneath Misfortune's blows 

As weel's I may ; 
Sworn foe to Sorrow, Care, and Prose, 

I rh3'^me away. 

ye douce folk, that live by rule, 
Grave, tideless-blooded, calm and cool, 
Compared wi' you — fool ! fool ! fool ! 

How much unlike ! 
Your hearts are just a standing pool, 

Your lives a dike ! 

J^ae harebrain'd, sentimental traces, 
In your unletter'd, nameless faces ! 
In arioso trills and graces 

Ye never stray, 
^ut gravissimo, solemn basses 

Ye hum away, 



A BREAM. 137 



Ye are sae grave, nae doubt ye're wise ; 

Nae ferly though ye do despise 

The hairum-scairura, ram-stam boys, 

The rattling squad : 
I see you upward cast your eyes — 

Ye ken the road. 

Whilst I — but I shall baud me there— 
Wi' you I'll scarce gang ony where — 
Then, Jamie, I shall say nae mair, 

But quat my sang, 
Content wi' you to mak a pair, 

Whare'er I gang. 



A DREAM. 

GUID-MORNIN' to your Majesty ! 
May Heaven augment your blisses, 
On every new birthday ye see, 

A humble poet wishes ! 
My hardship here, at your levee, 

On sic a day as this is, 
Is sure an uncouth sight to see, 
Amang thae birthday dresses 
Sae fine this day. 

I see ye're complimented thrang, 

By many a lord and lady ; 
'* God save the king " 's a cuckoo sang 

That's unco easy said aye ; 



138 A DREAM. 



The poets, too, a venal gang, 

Wi' rhymes weel-turn'd and ready, 

Wad gar ye trow ye ne'er do wrang, 
But aye unerring steady, 
On sic a day. 

For me, before a monarch's face. 

Even there I winna flatter ; 
For neither pension, post, nor place, 

Am I your humble debtor : 
So, nae reflection on your grace, 

Your kingship to bespatter ; 
There's mony waur been o' the race, 

And aiblins ane been better 

Than you this day. 

*Tis very true, my sovereign king, 

My skill may weel be doubted ; 
But facts are chiels that winna ding. 

And downa be disputed : 
Your royal nest, beneath your wing, 

Is e'en right reft and clouted, 
And now the third part of the string, 

And less will gang about it 

Than did ae day. 

Far be't frae me that I aspire 

To blame your legislation, 
Or say, ye wisdom want, or fire. 

To rule this mighty nation ! 
But, faith ! I muckle doubt, my sire, 

Ye've trusted ministration 
To chaps, wha, in a barn or byre. 

Wad better fiU'd their station 

Than courts yon day. 



A DREAM, 139 



And now ye've gien auld Britain peace, 

Her broken shins to plaister ; 
Your sair taxation does her fleece, 

Till she has scarce a tester : 
For me, thank God, my life's a lease, 

Nae l3argain wearing faster. 
Or, faith ! I fear that wi' the geese, 

I shortly boost to pasture 

r the craft some day. 

I'm no mistrusting Willie Pitt, 

When taxes he enlarges 
(And Will's a true guid fallow's got, 

A name not envy spairges), 
That he intends to pay your debt. 

And lessen a' your charges ; 
But, God*3-sake ! let nae saving fit 

Abridge your bonny barges 

And boats this day. 

Adieu, my liege ! may Freedom geek 

Beneath your high protection ; 
And may you rax Corruption's neck, 

And gie her for dissection ! 
But since I'm here, I'll no neglect. 

In loyal, true affection, 
To pay your queen with due respect. 

My fealty and subjection 

This great birtliday. 

Hail, Majesty Most Excellent ! 

While nobles strive to please ye, 
Will ye accept a compliment 

A simple poet gies ye ? 



140 A DREAM. 



Thae bonnie bairn-time, Heaven has lent, 
Still higher may they heeze ye 

In bliss, till fate some day is sent, 
For ever to release ye 

Frae care that day. 

For you, young potentate o' Wales, 

I tell your Highness fairly, 
Down pleasure's stream, wi' swelling sails, 

I'm tauld ye're driving rarely ; 
But some day ye may gnaw your nails, 

And curse your folly sairly, 
That e'er ye brak Diana's pales. 

Or rattled dice wi' Charlie. 

By night or day. 

Yet aft a ragged cowte's been known 

To mak a noble aiver ; 
So, ye may doucely fill a throne, 

For a' their clishmaclaver ; 
There, him at Agincourt wha shone, 

Few better were or braver : 
And yet, wi' funny, queer Sir Jolni, 

He was an unco shaver 

For mony a day. 

For you, right reverend Osnaburg, 

Nane sets the lawn-sleeve sweeter. 
Although a ribbon at your lug 

Wad been a dress completer : 
As ye disown yon paughty dog 

That bears the keys o' Peter, 
Then, swith ! and get a wife to hug, 

Or, trouth ! ye'll stain the mitre 
Some luckless day. 



A DREAM, 141 



YouDg, royal Tarry Brecks, I leani, 

Ye've lately come athwart her ; 
A iJ^lorious galley, stem and stern, 

Weel rigg'd for Venus' barter ; 
But first hang out, that she'll discern, 

Your hymeneal charter. 
Then heave aboard your grapple-airn, 

And large upon her quarter 

Come full that day. 

Ye, lastly, bonny blossoms a'. 

Ye royal lasses dainty, 
Heaven mak ye guid as weel as braw, 

And gie you lads a-plenty : 
But sneer na British boys awa', 

For kings are unco scant aye ; 
And German gentles are but sma', 

They're better just than want aye 
On ony day. 

God bless you a' ! consider now 

Ye' re unco muckle dautit ; 
But ere the course of life be through, 

It may be bitter sautit : 
And I hae seen their coggie fu', 

That yet hae tarrow't at it ; 
But or the day was done, I trow, 

The laggen they hae clautit 

Fu' clean that day. 



r 



142 



HOLY WILLIE'S PRAYER, 



TO A PAINTER. 

DEAR , I'll gie ye some advice, 
You'll tak it no uncivil: 
You shouldna paint at angels mair, 
But try and paint the devil. 

To paint an angel's kittle wark, 
Wi* auld Nick there's less danger ; 

You'll easy draw a weel-kent face, 
But no sae weel a stranger. 



HOLY WILLIE'S PRAYER. 

OTHOU, wha in the heavens dost dwell, 
Wha, as it pleases best thysel. 
Sends ane to heaven, and ten to hell, 

A' for thy glory, 
And no for ony guid or ill 

They've done afore thee ! 

I bless and praise thy matchless might, 
When thousands thou hast left in night, 
That I am here afore thy sight, 

*^ For gifts and grace, 

A burnin' and a shinin' light 

To a* this place. 

What was I, or my generation. 
That I should get sic exaltation ? 



HOL V WILLIE 'S PR A YER, 1 43 



I, wlia deserve sic just damnation 
For broken laws, 
• Five thousand years 'fore my creation,- 

Through Adam's cause. 

When frae my mither's womb I fell, 
Thou might hae plunged me into hell, 
To gnash my gums, to weep and wail, 

In burning lake, 
Where daranM devils roar and yell, 

Chain'd to a stake. 

Yet I am here a chosen sample, 

To show thy grace is great and ample ; 

I'm here a pillar in thy temple, 

Strong as a rock, 
A guide, a buckler, an example, 

To a' thy flock. 

Lord, thou kens what zeal I bear. 
When drinkers drink, and swearers swear, 
And singing there, and dancing here, 

Wi' great and sma' ; 
For I am keepit by thy fear. 

Free frae them a*. 

But yet, Lord ! confess I must. 
At times I'm fash'd wi' fleshly lust ; 
And sometimes, too, wi' warldly trust 

Vile self gets in ; 
But thou remembers we are dust. 

Defiled in sin. 

Lord ! yestreen, thou kens, wi' Meg— 
Thy pardon I sincerely beg, 



1 44 HOL V WILLIE '5 PRA YER, 



Oil, may it ne'er be a livin' plague, 
To my dishonour, 

And I'll ne'er lift a lawless leg 

Again upon her. 

Besides, I further maun avow, 

Wi' Lizzie's lass, three times I trow — 

But, Lord, that Friday I was fou' 

When I cam near her, 
Or else, thou kens, thy servant true 

Wad ne'er hae steer'd her. 

Maybe thou lets this fleshly thorn 

Beset thy servant e'en and morn. 

Lest he owre high and proud should turn, 

'Cause he's sae gifted ; 
If sae, thy ban' maun e'en be borne 

Until thou lift it. 

Lord, bless thy chosen in this place, 
For here thou hast a chosen race : 
But God confound their stubborn face, 

And blast their name, 
Wha bring thy elders to disgrace 

And public shame. 

Lord, mind Gaw'n Hamilton's deserts. 
He drinks and swears, and plays at cartes, 
Yet has sae mony taking arts, 

Wi' grit and sma'. 
Frae God's ain priests the people's hearts 

He steals awa'. 
« 
And when we chastened him therefore, 
Thou kens how he bred sic a splore, 



As set the world in a roar i 

0' laughin' at us — | 

Curse thou his basket and his store, | 

Kail and potatoes. • 



Lord, hear my earnest cry and prayer 

Against the presbyt'ry of Ayr ; 

Thy strong right hand, Lord, mak it bare 

Upo' their heads, 
Lord, weigh it down, and dinna spare, 

For their misdeeds. 

Lord, my God, that glib-tongued Aiken, 

My very heart and saul are quakin'. 

To think how we stood groanin', shakin', 

And swat wi' dread, 
While he, wi' hingin' lip and snakin', 

Held up his head. 

Lord, in the day of vengeance try him, 
Lord, visit them wha did employ him, 
And pass not in thy mercy by 'em. 

Nor hear their prayer , 
But for thy people's sake destroy 'em, 

And dinna spare. 

-tBut, Lord, remember me and mine, 

Wi' mercies temp'ral and divine. 
That I for gear and grace may shine, 

Excell'd by nane, 
And a' the glory shall be thine, 

Amen, Amen I 



K-k 



EPITAPH ON HOLY WILLIE. 

HERE Holy Willie's sair worn clay 
Taks up its last abode ; 
His saul has ta'en some other way, 
I fear the left-hand road. 

Stop ! there he is, as sure's a gun, 

Poor silly bod}^, see him ; 
Nae wonder he's as black's the gruii'— 

Observe wha's standing wi' him ! 

Your brunstane devilship, I see, 
Has got him there before ye ; 

But baud your nine-tail cat a wee, 
Till ance ye've heard my story. 

Your pity I will not implore. 

For pity ye hae nane ! 
Justice, alas ! has gien him o'er. 

And mercy's day is gane. 

But hear me, sir, deil as ye are. 
Look something to your credit ; 

A coof like him wad stain your name, 
If it were kent ye did it. 




THE VISION, t47 



ON A WAG IN MAUCHLINE. 

LAMENT him, Maucliline husbands a', 
He often did assist ye ; 
For had ye staid whole years awa', 

Your wives they ne'er had missed ye. 
Ye Mauchline bairns, as on ye pass 

To school in bands thegither, 
Oh, tread ye lightly on his grass — 
Perhaps he was your father. 



THE VISION. 

DUAN FIEST. 

THE sun had closed the winter day, 
The curlers quat their roaring play, 
And hunger'd maukin ta'en her way 
To kail -yards green, 
While faithless snaws ilk step betray 
Whare she has been. 

The thrasher's weary flingin'-tree 
The lee-lang day had tired me ; 
And when the day had closed his e'e, 

Far i' the west, 
Ben i' the spence, right pensivelie, 

I gaed to rest. 

There, lanely, by the ingle-cheek, 
I sat and eyed the spewing reek, 



148 THE VISION. 



That fiU'd, wi' hoast-provoking smeek, 
The auld clay biggin' ; 

And heard the restless rattons squeak 
About the riggin'. 

All in this mottie, misty clime, 
I backward mused on wasted time, 
How I had spent my youthfu' prime, 

And done naething. 
But stringin' blethers up in rhyme, 

For fools to sing. 

Had I to guid advice but harkit, 
I might by this hae led a market, 
Or strutted in a bank, and clerkit 

My cash-account : 
While here, half-mad, half-fed, half-sarkit, 

Is a' th' amount. 

I started, muttering. Blockhead ! coof 1 
And heaved on high my wauket loof, 
To swear by a' yon starry roof. 

Or some rash aith, 
That I henceforth would be rhyme-proof 

Till my last breath — 

When, click ! the string the sneck did draw, 
And, jee ! the door gaed to the wa' ; 
And by my ingle-lowe I saw. 

Now bleezin' bright, 
A tight, outlandish hizzie, braw. 

Come full in sight. 

Ye needna doubt, I held my whisht ; 
The infant aith, half-form'd, was crusht ; 



THE VISION, 149 



I glower'd as eerie's I'd been dusht 

In some wild glen ; 

When sweet, like modest worth, she blusht, 
And stepped ben. 

Green, slender, leaf-clad holly-boughs 
Were twisted, gracefu', round her brows — 
I took her for some Scottish Muse, 

By that same token ; 
And come to stop those reckless vows, 

Would soon been broken. 

A " hare-brain'd, sentimental trace '* 
Was strongly markM in her face ; 
A wildly- witty, rustic grace 

Shone full upon her ; 
Her eye, e'en turn'd on empty space, 

Beam'd keen with Honour. 

Down flow'd her robe, a tartan sheen. 
Till half a leg was scrimply seen ; 
And such a leg ! my bonny Jean 

Could only peer it ; 
Sae straught, sae taper, tight, and clean, 

Nane else cam near it. 

Her mantle large, of greenish hue. 

My gazing wonder chiefly drew ; 

Deep lights and shades, bold-mingling, threw 

A lustre grand ; 
And seem'd, to my astonish'd view, 

A well-known land. 

Here, rivers in the sea were lost ; 
There, mountains to the skies were tost 2 



Here, tumbling billows mark'd the coast, 
With surging foam ; 

There, distant shone Art's lofty boast, 
The lordly dome. 

Here, Doon pour'd down his far-fetch'd floods ; 
There, well-fed Irwine stately thuds : 
Auld hermit Ayr staw through his woods, 

On to the shore ; 
And many a lesser torrent scuds, 

With seeming roar. 

Low, in a sandy valley spread, 

An ancient Borough rear'd her head : 

Still, as in Scottish story read. 

She boasts a race 
To every nobler virtue bred, 

And polish'd grace. 

By stately tow'r or palace fair, 

Or ruins pendent in the air, 

Bold stems of heroes, here and there, 

I could discern ; 
Some seem'd to muse, some seem'd to dare. 

With features stern. 

My heart did glowing transport feel, 

To see a race heroic wheel. 

And brandish round the deep-dyed steel 

In sturdy blows ; 
While back-recoiling seem'd to reel 

Their Suthron foes. 

His Country's Saviotjr, mark him well 1 
Bold Richardton's heroic swell ; 



THE VISION. 151 



The Chief on Saik who glorious fell, 
In high command ; 

And he whom ruthless fates expel 
His native land. 

There, where a sceptred Pictish shade 
Stalk'd round his ashes lowly laid, 
1 mark'd a martial race, portray'd 

In colours strong ; 
Bold, soldier-featur'd, undismay'd 

They strode along. 

Through many a wild romantic grove, 
Near many a hermit-fancied cove 
(Fit haunts for friendship or for love, 

In musing mood), 
An aged Judge, I saw him rove. 

Dispensing good. 

With deep-struck, reverential awe 
The learned sire and son I saw, 
By Nature's God and Nature's law 

They gave their lore, 
This, all its source and end to draw ; 

That, to adore. 

Brydone's brave ward I well could spy. 
Beneath old Scotia's smiling eye : 
Who call'd on Fame, low stand insj by, 

To hand Liui un, 
W^here many a patriot nnme on high 

And heio shone. 



152 THE VISION. 



DUAN SECOND. 

With musing-deep, astonish'd stare, 
I view'd the heavenly seeming fair ; 
A whispering throb did witness bear 

Of kindred sweet, 
When with an elder sister's air 

She did me greet : — 

'* All hail I my own inspired bard ! 
In thee thy native Muse regard ; 
Nor longer mourn thy fate is hard, 

Thus poorly low ! 
I come to give thee such reward 

As we bestow. 

** Know, the great Genius of this land 
Has many a light, aerial band, 
Who, all beneath his high command. 

Harmoniously, 
As Arts or Arms they understand. 

Their labours ply. 

** They Scotia's race among them share ; 
Some fire the soldier on to dare : 
Some rouse the patriot up to bare 

Corruption's heart : 
Some teach the bard, a darling care. 

The tunefu' art. 

" 'Moug swelling floods of reeking gore, 
They, ardent, kindling spirits, pour ; 
Or, 'mid the venal senate's roar. 

They, sightless, stand, 
To mend the honest patriot-lore, 

And grace the hand. 



THE VISION. 153 



** And when the hard, or hoary sage, 
Charm or instruct the future age, 
They bind the wild, poetic rage, 

In energy, 
Or point the inconclusive page 

Full on the eye. 

** Hence, Fullarton, the brave and young ; 
Hence, Dempster's zeal-inspired tongue ; 
Hence, sweet harmonious Beattie sung 

His " Minstrel " lays ; 
Or tore, with noble ardour stung. 

The sceptic's bays. 

** To lower orders are assign' d 
The humbler ranks of humankind, 
The rustic bard, the labouring hind, 

The artisan ; 
All choose, as various they're inclined, 

The various man. 

" When yellow waves the heavy grain, 
The threat'ning storm some, strongly, rein 
Some teach to meliorate the plain, 

With tillage skill ; 
And some instruct the shepherd-train, 

Blithe o'er the hill. 

* * Some hint the lover's harmless wile ; 
Some grace the maiden's artless smile ; 
Some soothe the labourer's weary toil, 

For humble gains, 
And make his cottage-scenes beguile 

His cares and pains. 



154 THE VISION. 



''Some, bounded to a district-space, 
Explore at large man's infant race, 
To mark the embryotic trace 

Of rustic bard : 
And careful note each opening grace, 

A guide and guard. 

** Of these am I — Coila my name ; j 

And this district as mine I claim, y 

Where once the Campbells, chiefs of fame, \ 

Held ruling power : \ 
1 mark'd thy embryo-tuneful flame, 

Thy natal hour. 

' ' With future hope, I oft would gaze, ] 

Fond, on thy little early ways, 
Thy rudely-caroll'd, chiming phrase, 

In uncouth rhymes, 
Fired at the simple, artless lays 

Of other times. 

** I saw thee seek the sounding shore, 
Delighted with the dashing roar ; 
Or when the north his fleecy store 

Drove through the sky, 
I saw grim Nature's visage hoar 

Struck thy young eye. 

" Or when the deep green-mantled earth 
Warm cherish'd every flow'ret's birth, 
And joy and music pouring forth 

In every grove, 
I saw thee eye the general vnirth 

With boundless love. 



THE VISION. 155 



"When ripen'd fields, and azure skies, 
Call'd forth the reaper's rustling noise, 
I saw thee leave their evening joys, 

And lonely stalk, 
To vent thy bosom's swelling rise 

In pensive walk. 

''When youthful love, warm-blushing, strong, 
Keen-shivering shot thy nerves along, 
Those accents, grateful to thy tongue, 

Th' adored Name, 
I taught thee how to pour in song. 

To soothe thy flame. 

** I saw thy pulse's maddening play. 
Wild, send thee Pleasure's devious way, 
Misled by Fancy's meteor-ray. 

By passion driven ; 
^ut yet the light that led astray 

Was light from Heaven. 

** I taught thy manners-painting strains, 
The loves, the ways of simple swains, 
Till now, o'er all my wide domains 

Thy fame extends ; 
And some, the pride of Coila's plains. 

Become thy friends. 

**Thou canst not learn, nor can I show, 
To paint with Thomson's landscape glow ; 
Or wake the bosom-melting throe. 

With S hen stone's art j 
Or pour, with Gray, the moving flow 

Warm on the heart. 



IS6 THE VISION. 



"Yet, all beneath the uurivall'd rose, 

The lowly daisy sweetly blows ; 

Though large the forest's monarch throws 

His army shade, 
Yet green the juicy hawthorn grows, 

Adown the glade. 

**Then never murmur nor repine ; 
Strive in thy humble sphere to shine ; 
And trust me, not Potosi's mine, 

Nor kings* regard, 
Can give a bliss o'ermatching thine — 

A rustic bard. 

** To give my counsels all in one — 
Thy tuneful flame still careful fan ; 
Preserve the dignity of Man, 

With soul erect ; 
And trust, the Universal Plan 

Will all protect. 

" And wear thou this" — she solemn said, 
And bound the holly round my head : . 
The polish'd leaves, and berries red, 

Did rustling play ; 
And, like a passing thought, she fled 

In lisfht awav. 



LINES 

WRITTEN IN friars' CARSE HERMITAGE, ON THE 
BANKS OF THE NITII. 

{First Version.) 

THOU whom chance may hither lead, 
Be tlioii clad in russet weed, 
Bo thou deckt in silken stole, 
Grave these maxims on thy soul : — 

Life is but a day at most, 

Sprung from night, in darkness lost. 

Day, how rapid in its flight — 

Da)'-, how few must see the night ; 

Hope not sunshine every hour. 

Fear not clouds will always lower. 

Happiness is but a name, 

Make content and ease thy aim ; 

Ambition is a meteor gleam ; 

Fame an idle, restless dream : 

Pleasures, insects on the wing 

Round Peace, the tenderest flower of Spring ! 

Those that sip the dew alone. 

Make the butterflies thy own ; 

Those that would the bloom devour, 

Crush the locusts — save the flower. 

For the future be prepared, 

Guard whatever thou canst guard : 

But, thy utmost duly done, 

Welcome what thou canst not shun. 

Follies past give thou to air. 

Make their consequence thy care ; 



Keep the name of man in mind, 
And dishonour not thy kind. 
Reverence with lowly heart 
Him whose wondrous work thou art ; 
Keep his goodness still in view, 
Thy trust — and thy example too. 

Stranger, go ! Heaven be thy guide I 
Quoth the beadsman of Nithside. 



LINES 

WRITTEN IN FKIARS' CAUSE HEKMITAGE, ON NITHSIDE. 

{Second Version.) 

THOU whom chance may hither lead, 
Be thou clad in russet weed, 
Be thou deckt in silken stole, 
Grave these counsels on thy soul : — 

Life is but a day at most, 

Sprung from night, in darkness lost ; 

Hope not sunshine every hour. 

Fear not clouds will always lower, 

As Youth and Love with sprightly dance. 

Beneath thy morning-star advance, 

Pleasure, with her siren air. 

May delude tlie thoughtless pair ; 

Let Prudence bless Enjoyment's cup, 

Then raptured sip, and sip it up. 



LINES. 159 



As th}^ day grows warm and liigli, 

Life's meridian flaming nigh, 

Dost thou spurn the humble vale ? 

Life's proud summits wouldst thou scale? 

Check thy climbing step, elate, 

Evils lurk in felon wait : 

Dangers, eagle-pinion'd, bold, 

Soar around each cliffy hold, 

While cheerful Peace, with linnet song, 

Chants the lowly dells among. 



As the shades of evening close, 

Beckoning thee to long repose ; 

As li^e itself becomes disease. 

Seek the chimney-neuk of ease, 

There ruminate with sober thought 

On all thou'st seen, and heard, and wrought ; 

And teach the sportive younkers round, 

Saws of experience sage and sound : 

Say man's true, genuine estimate, 

The grand criterion of his fate, 

Is not — Art thou high or low ? 

Did thy fortune ebb or flow ? 

Wast thou cottager or king ? 

Peer or peasant ? — no such thing ! 

Did many talents gild thy span ? 

Or frugal Nature grudge thee one ? 

Tell them, and press it on their mind, 

As thou thyself must shortly find. 

The smile or frown of awful Heaven 

To Virtue or to Vice is given. 

Say, ** To be just, and kind, and wise, 

There solid Self-enjoyment lies ; 



i6o ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID. 



That foolish, selfish, faithless ways 
Lead to the wretched, vile, and base." 

Thus resign'd and quiet, creep 
To the bed of lasting sleep ; 
Sleep, whence thou shalt ne'er awake, 
Night, where dawn shall never break, 
Till future life — future no more — 
To light and joy the good restore, 
To light and joy unknown before ! 

Stranger, go ! Heaven be thy guide I 
Quoth the beadsman of Nithside. 



ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID, OR THE 
RIGIDLY RIGHTEOUS. 

OYE wha are sae guid yoursel, 
Sae pious and sae holy, 
You've nought to do but mark and tell 

Your neibour's fauts and folly ! 
Whase life is like a weel-gaun mill, 

Supplied wi' store o' water, 
The heapet happer's ebbing still. 
And still the clap plays clatter. 

Hear me, ye venerable core, 

xis counsel for poor mortals. 
That frequent pass douce Wisdom's door 

For glaikit Folly's portals ; 



I, for tlieir thoughtless, careless sakes, \ 

Would here propone defences, 
Their donsie tricks, their black mistakes, 

Their failings and mischances. 

Ye see your state wi' theirs compared, 

And shudder at the niffer, 
But cast a moment's fair regard, 

What maks the mighty differ ? 
Discount what scant occasion gave, 

That purity ye pride in, 
^ And (what's aft mair than a* the lave) 

Your better art o* hiding. 

Think, when yon^ castigated pulse 

Gies now and then a wallop, 
What ragings must M§ veins convulse, 

That still eternal gallop : 
Wi' wind and tide fair i' your tail. 

Right on ye scud your sea-way ; 
But in the teeth o' baith to sail, 

It makes an unco lee- way. 

See social life and glee sit down, 

All joyous and unthinking, 
Till, quite transraugrified, they're grown 
Debauchery and drinking : 
( Oh would they stay to calculate 
V The eternal consequences : 
Or your more dreaded hell to state, 
Damnation of expenses ! 

Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames, 
Tied up in godly laces, 
L-1 



l62 



TAM SAMSON'S ELEGY, 



VBefore ye gie poor frailty names, 

Suppose a change o' cases ; 
A dear-loved lad, convenience snug, 

A treacherous inclination — 
But, let me whisper i' your lug, 

Ye're aiblins nae temptation. 

Then gently scan your brother man, 

Still gentler sister woman ; 
Though they may gang a kennin* wrang, 
^ To step aside is human : 
One point must still be greatly dark, 

The moving why they do it : 
And just as lamely can ye mark ) 

How far perhaps they rue it. y 

Who made the heart, 'tis He alone 

Decidedly can try us ; 
He knows each chord — its various tone, 

Each spring — its various bias : 
Then at the balance let's be mute, 
-"■' ^--"We never can adjust it ; 

What's done we partly may compute, y 

But know not what's resisted. J»^ 



TAM SAMSON'S ELEGY. 

HAS auld Kilmarnock seen the deil ? 
Or great Mackinlay thrawn his heel ? 
Or Bobinson again grown weel, 

To preach and read ? 
** Na, waur than a' ! " cries ilka chiel, 

" Tarn Samson's dead ! " 



Kilmarnock laiig may grunt and grane, 
And sigh, and sab, and greet her lane, 
And deed her bairns, man, wife, and wean, 

In mourn in' weed ; 
To Death, she's dearly paid the kane — 

Tarn Samson's dead ! 

The brethren o' the mystic level 
May hing their head in waefu' bevel, 
While by their nose the tears will revel, 

Like ony bead ; 
Death's gien the lodge an unco devel — 

Tarn Samson's dead ! 

When Winter muffles up his cloak, 
And binds the mire up like a rock ; 
When to the lochs the curlers flock 

AVi' gleesome speed, 
Wha will they station at the cock ? — 

Tarn Samson's dead ! 

He was the king o* a' the core, 

To guard, or draw, or wick a bore ; 

Or up the rink like Jehu roar 

In time o' need ; 
But now he lags on Death's hog-score — 

Tarn Samson's dead ! 

Now safe the stately saumon sail, 
And trout be-dropp'd wi' crimson hail, 
And eels weel kenn'd for souple tail, 

And geds for greed, 
Since dark in Death's fish-creel we wail 

Tarn Samson dead ! 



i64 TAM SAMSON'S ELEGY, 



Rejoice, ye birring paitricks a* ; 
Ye cootie moorcocks, crousely craw ; 
Ye maukins, cock your fud fu' braw, 

Withouten dread ; 
Your mortal fae is now awa* — 

Tarn Samson's dead ! 

That waefu' morn be ever mourn' d 
Saw him in shooting graith adorn'd. 
While pointers round impatient biirn'd, 

Frae couples freed ; 
But, och ! he gaed and ne'er return'd ! 

Tam Samson's dead ! 

In vain auld age his body batters ; 
In vain the gout his ankles fetters ; 
In vain the burns cam' down like waters, 

An acre braid ! 
Now every auld wife, greetin', clatters, 

Tam Samson's dead ! 

Owre mony a weary hag he limpit, 
And aye the tither shot he thumpit, 
Till coward Death behind him jumpit, 

Wi' deadly feide ; 
Now he proclaims, wi' tout o' trumpet, 

Tam Samson's dead ! 

When at his heart he felt the dagger, 

He reel'd his wonted bottle-swagger, 

But yet he drew the mortal trigger 

Wi' weel-aim'd heed ; 

" Lord, five 1 " he cried, and owre did stagger- 
Tarn Samson's dead ! 



TAM SAMSON'S ELEGY, 165 



Ilk hoary hunter mourn'd a brither ; 
Ilk sportsman youth bernoan'd a father : 
Yon auld grey stane, amang the heather, 

Marks out his head, 
Whare Burns has wrote, in rhyming blether, 

Tarn Samson's dead 1 

There low he lies, in lasting rest ; 
Perhaps upon his mouldering breast 
Some spitefu' moorfowl bigs her nest, 

To hatch and breed ; 
Alas ! nae mair he'll them molest ! 

Tarn Samson's dead ! 

When August winds the heather wave, 
And sportsmen wander by yon grave. 
Three volleys let his memory crave 

0' pouther and lead, 
Till Echo answer frae her cave — 

Tam Samson's dead ! 

Heaven rest his saul, whare'er he be 1 
Is the wish o' mony mae than me ; 
He had twa fauts, or maybe three. 

Yet what remead ? 
Ae social honest man want we — 

Tam Samson's dead ! 

EPITAPH. 

Tam Samson's weel-worn clay here lies, 

Ye canting zealots, spare him ! 
If honest worth in heaven rise, 

Ye'll mend or ye win near him. 



i66 HALLOWEEN, 



PER CONTRA. 

Pro, Fame, and canter like a filly, 
Through a' the streets and neuks o* KilliV, 
Tell every social, honest billie 

To cease his grievin', 
For yet, iinskaithecl by Death's gleg gnllie, 

Tarn Sampson's leeviu' ! 



HALLOWEEN". 

UPON that night, when fairies light 
On Cassilis Downans dance, 
Or owre the lays, in splendid blaze, 

On sprightly coursers prance ; 
Or for Colean the route is ta'en, 

Beneath the moon's pale beams ; 
There, np the cove, to stray and rove, 
Among the rocks and streams 

To sport that night. 

Among the bonny winding banks 

Where Doon rins, wimplin', clear. 
Where Bruce ance ruled the martial ranks, 

And shook his Carrick spear. 
Some merry, friendly, country-folks 

Together did convene, 
To burn their nits, and pou their stocks, 

And baud their Halloween 

Fu' blithe that night. 



HALLOWEEN. 167 



The lasses feat, and cleanly neat, 

Mair braw than when they're fine ; 
Their faces blithe, fu' sweetly kythc, 

Hearts leal, and warm, and kin' : 
The lads sae trig, wi' wooer-babs, 

Weel knotted on their garten, 
Some unco blate, and some wi* gabs, 

Gar lasses' hearts gang startin' 

Whiles last at night. 

Then, first and foremost, through the kail, 

Their stocks maun a' be sought ance ; 
They steek their een, and graip and wale, 

For muckle anes and straught anes. 
Poor hav'rel Will fell aff the drift, 

And wander'd through the bow-kail, 
And yjou't, for want 0' better shift, 

A runt was like a sow-tail, 

Sae bow't that night. 

Then, straught or crooked, yird or iiane, 

They roar and cry a' throu'tber ; 
The very wee things-, toddlin', rin, 

Wi* stocks out-owre their shoutiier; 
And gif the custoc's sweet or sour, 

Wi' joctelegs they taste them ; 
Syne cosily, aboon the door, 

Wi* cannie care, they've placed them 
To lie that night 

The lasses staw frae 'mang them a' 

To pou their stalks 0' corn : 
But Rab slips out, and jinks about, 

Behint the muckle thorn ; 



i68 HALLOWEEN, 



He grippet Nelly hard and fast ; 

Loud skirl' d a' the lasses ; 
But her tap-pickle maist was lost, 

When kitlin' in the fause-house 
Wi' him that night. 

The auld guidwife's weel-hoordit nits 

Are round and round divided, 
And mony lads' and lasses' fates 

Are there that night decided : 
Some kindle coothie, side by side, 

And burn thegither trimly ; 
Some start awa' wi' saucy pride, 

And jump out-owre the chimlie 

Fu' high that night. 

Jean slips in twa wi' ten tie e'e ; 

Wha 'twas she wadna tell ; 
But this is Jock, and this is me, 

She says in to hersel : 
He bleezed owre her, and she owre him, 

As they wad never mair part ; 
Till, fuff ! he started up the lum, 

And Jean had e'en a sair heart 

To see't that night. 

Poor Willie, wi' his bow-kail runt. 

Was brunt wi* primsie Mallie ; 
And Mallie, nae doubt, took the drunt, 

To be compared to Willie ; 
Mall's nit lap out wi' pridefu' fling, 

And her ain fit it brunt it ; 
While Willie lap, and swore by jing, 

'Twas just the way he wanted 
To be that night. 



HALLOWEEN. 169 


Nell had the fause-house in her min', 


She pits hersel and Rob in ; 


In loving bleeze they sweetly join, 


Till white in ase they're sobbin' ; 


Nell's heart was dancin* at the view, 


She whisper'd Rob to leuk for't ; 


Rob, stowlins, prie'd her bonny mou', 


Fu' cosie in the neuk for't, 


Unseen that night. 


But Merran sat behint their backs, 


Her thoughts on Andrew Bell ; 


She lea'es them gashin' at their cracks, 


And slips out by hersel : 


She through the yard the nearest taks, 


And to the kiln she goes then, 


And darklins graipit for the bauks, 


And in the blue-clue throws then, 


. Right fear't that night. 


J And aye she win't, and aye she swat, 


) I wat she made nae jaukin', 


\ Till something held within the pat, 


\ Guid Lord ! but she was quakin* ! 


\ But whether 'twas the deil himsel, 


I Or whether 'twas a bauk-en', 


Or whether it was Andrew Bell, 


She didna wait on talkin' 


\ To speir that night. 


1 Wee Jenny to her grannie says, 


J ** Will you go wi' me, grannie ? 


\ I'll eat the apple at the glass 


"\ I gat frae Uncle Johnnie : " 



I70 HALLOWEEN. 



She fufft her pipe wi' sic a lunt, 
In wrath she was sae vap'rin', 

She notic't na, an aizle brunt 
Her braw new worset apion 

Out through that night. 

" Ye little skelpie-limmer's face ! 

I daur you try sic sportin', 
As seek the foul thief ony place, 

For him to spae your fortune ; 
Xae doubt but ye may get a sight ! 

Great cause ye hae to fear it ; 
For mony a ane has gotten a Triglit, 

And lived and died deleeret 
On sic a night. 

" Ae hairst afore the Sherramoor — 

I mind't as weel's yestreen, 
I was a gilpey then, I'm sure 

I wasna past fifteen ; 
The simmer had been cauld and wat, 

And stuff was unco green ; 
And aye a rantin' kirn we gat, 

And iust on Halloween 

It fell that night. 

** Our stibble-rig Tvas Rab M'Graen, 

A clever, sturdy fallow : 
His son gat Eppie Sim wi' wean. 

That lived in Acbmacalla : 
He gat hemp-seed, I mind it weel, 

And he made unco light o*t ; 
But mony a day was by himsel, 

He was sae sairly frighted 

That very night." 



HALLOWEEN, 171 



J 



Tlien up gat fechtin' Jamie Fleck, 

And he swore by his conscience, 
That he could saw hemp-seed a peck ; 

For it was a' but nonsense. 
The auld guiclman raught down the pock, 

And out a handfu' gied him ; 
Syne bade him slip frae 'mang the folk, 

Some time when nae ane see'd him, 
And try't that night. 

He marches through amang the stacks. 

Though he was something sturtin ; 
The graip he for a harrow taks, 

And hauls it at his curpin ; 
And every now and then he says, 

** Hemp-seed, I saw thee. 
And her that is to be my lass, 

Come after me, and draw thee 

As fast this night." 

He whistled up Lord Lennox* march 
To keep his courage cheery ; 



I Although his hair began to arch, 



He was say fley'd and eerie : 
Till presently he hears a squeak, 

And then a grane and gruntle ; 
He by his shouther gae a keek. 

And tumbled wi* a wintle 

Out-owre that night. 

He roar'd a horrid murder-shout. 

In dreadfu* desperation ! 
And young and auld cam rinnin' out 

To hear the sad narration : 



He swore 'twas hilchin Jean M 'Craw, 
Or crouchie Merran Humpliie, 

Till, stop ! she trotted through them a'- 
And wha was it but grumphic 

Asteer that night ! 

Meg fain wad to the barn hae gaen, 

To win three wechts o* naethiiig ! 
But for to meet the deil her lane, 

She pat but little faith in : 
She gies the herd a pickle nits, 

And twa red-cheekit apples, 
To watch, while for the barn she sets, 

In hopes to see Tam Kipples 
That very nicht. 

She turns the key wi* cannie thraw, 

And owre the threshold ventures ; 
But first on Sawnie gies a ca', 

Syne bauldly in she enters ; 
A ratton rattled up the wa', 

And she cried. Lord, preserve her ! 
And ran through midden-hole and a', 

And pray'd wi* zeal and fervour, 
Fu' fast that night. 

They hoy't out Will, wi' sair advice ; 

They hecht him some fine braw ane ; 
It chanced the stack he faddom't thrice, 

Was timmer-propt for thrawin' ; 
He taks a swirlie, auld moss-oak. 

For some black, grousome carlin ; 
And loot a winze, and drew a stroke, 

Till skin in blypes cam haurlin* 

Atf's nieves that nifdit. 



HALLOWEEN, 173 



A wanton widow Leezie was, 

As cant}^ as a kittlin ; 
But, och ! that night, amang the shaws, 

She got a fearfu' settlin' ! 
She through the whins, and by the caii u, 

And owie the hill gaed scrievin, 
Whare three lairds' lands met at a burn, 

To dip her left sark-sleeve in, 

Was bent that night. 

Whyles owre a linn the burnie plays, 

As through the glen it wimpl't ; 
Whyles round a rocky scaur it strays ; 

Whyles in a wiel it dim pi' t ; 
Whyles glitter'd to the nightly rays, 

Wi' bickering, dancing dazzle ; 
Whyles cookit underneath the braes, 

Below the spreading hazel, 

Unseen that night 

Amang the brackens, on the brae, 

Between her and the moon, 
The deil, or else an outler quey, 

Gat up an gae a croon : 
Poor Leezie's heart maist lap the hool ! 

Near lav' rock-height she jumpit ; 
But mist a fit, and in the pool 

Out-owre the lugs she plumpit, 

Wi' a plunge that night. 

In order, on the clean hearth-stane, 

The higgles three are ranged, 
And every time great care is ta'en 

To see them dulv changed : 



1 74 • CAS TLE- GORDON, 



Auld Uncle John, wha wedlock's jo3''s 

Sin' Mar's year did desire, 
liucause he gat the toom dish thrice, 

He heaved them on the hre 

In wrath that night. 

A¥i' merry sangs, and friendly cracks, 

I wat they didna weary ; 
And unco tales, and funny jokes, 

Their sports were cheap and cheery ; 
Till butter'd so'ns, wi' fragrant lunt, 

Set a' their gabs a-steerin' ; 
Syne, wi' a social glass o' strunt, 

Thej^ parted aff careerin' 

Fu' blythe that night. 



CASTLE-GORDOlSr. 

STREAMS that glide in orient plains, 
Never bound by Winter's chains ! 
Glowing here on golden sands, 

There commix'd with foulest stains 
From tyranny's empurpled bands : 
These, their richly-gleaming waves, 
I leave to tyrants and their slaves ; 
Give me the stream that sweetly laves 
The banks by Castle-Gordon. 

Spicy forests, ever gay, 
Shading from the burning ray 

Hapless wretches sold to toil. 
Or the ruthless native's way, 

Bent on slaughter, blood, and spoil : 



INSCRIPTION. 175 



Woods that ever verdant wave, 
I leave the tyrant and the slave ; 
Give me the groves that lofty brave 
The storms by Castle-Gordon. 

Wildly here without control, 
Nature reigns and rules the whole ; 

In that sober pensive mood, 
Dearest to the feeling soul, 

She plants the forest, pours the flooc] : 
Life's poor day I'll musing rave, 
And find at night a sheltering cave, 
Where waters flow and wild woods wave, 

By bonny Castle- Gordon. 



INSCRIPTION ON THE TOMBSTONE ERECTED 

BY BURNS TO THE MEMORY 

OF FERGUSSON. 

" Here lies Robert Fergusson, Poet, born 5th Sept. 1751. 
Died 16th October 1774." 

NO sculp' ur*d marble here, nor pompous lay, 
"1^0 storied urn, nor animated bust ; " 
This simple stone directs pale Scotia's way 
To pour her sorrows o'er her Poet's dust. 



THE AULD FARMER'S NEW-YEAR MORNING 
SALUTATION TO HIS AULD MARE MAGGIE, 

ON GIVING HER THE ACCUSTOMED RIP OF CORN 
TO HANSEL IN THE NEW YEAR. 

AGUID New- Year I wish thee, Maggie ! 
Hae, there's a rip to thy auld baggie : 
Though thou's howe-backit now and knaggie, 

I've seen the day 
Thou could hae gaen like ony staggie 
Out-owre the lay. 

Though now thou's dowie, stiff, and crazy, 
And thy auld hide's as white's a daisy, 
I've seen thee dappl't, sleek, and glazie, 

A bonny grey : 
He should been tight that daur't to raize thee, 

Ance in a day. 

Thou ance was i' the foremost rank, 
A filly buirdly, steeve, and swank, 
And set weel down a shapely shank, 

As e'er tread yird ; 
And could hae flown out-owre a stank, 

Like ony bird. 

It's now some nine-and twenty year, 
Sin' thou was my guid father's meer : 
He gied me thee, o* tocher clear, 

And fifty mark ; 
Though it was sma', twas weel-won gear, 

And thou was stark. 



THE AULD FARMER'S MARE, 177 



When first I gaed to woo my Jenny, 
Ye then was trottin' wi' your minnie ; 
Though ye was trickle, slee, and funnie. 

Ye ne'er was donsie ; 
But hamely, tawie, quiet, cannie, 

And unco sonsie. 

That day ye pranced wi' muckle pride 
When ye bure hame my bonnie bride : 
And sweet and gracefu' she did ride, 

Wi' maiden air ! 
Kyle-Stewart I could hae bragg'd wide 

For sic a pair. 

Though now ye dow but hoyte and hobble. 
And wintle like a saumont-coble, 
That day ye was a j inker noble, 

For heels and win* ! 
And ran them till they a' did wauble, 

Far, far, behin' ! 

When thou and I were young and skeigh, 

And stable-meals at fairs were dreigh. 

How thou would prance, and snore, and skreigh, 

And tak the road ! 
Town's bodies ran, and stood abeigh, 

And ca't thee mad. 

When thou was corn't, and I was mellow, 
We took the road aye like a swallow : 
At Brooses thou had ne'er a fellow, 

For pith and speed ; 
But every tail thou pay't them hollow, 

Whare'er thou gaed. 
Mm 



i;8 THE AULD FARMER'S MARE, 



.1 The sma' droop-rumpl't, hunter cattle, 

■ Might aiblins waur't thee for a brattle ; 

I But sax Scotch miles thou try't their mettle, 
\ And gar't them whaizle : 

j Nae whup nor spur, but just a wattle 
* O' saugh or hazel. 

Thou was a noble fittie-lan*, 

As e'er in tug or tow was drawn ! 

Aft thee and I, in aught hours' gaun, 

In guid March weathei*, 
Hae turn'd sax rood beside our han', 

For days thegither. 

Thou never braindg't, and fech't, and fliskit, 
But thy auld tail thou wad hae whiskit, 
And spread abreed thy well-fiU'd brisket, 

Wi' pith and power, 
'Till spritty knowes wad rair't and risket, 

And sly pet owre. 

When frosts lay lang, and snaws were deep, 
And threatened labour back to keep, 
I gied thy cog a wee bit heap 

Aboon the timmer ; 
I kenn'd my Maggie wadna sleep 

For that, or simmer. 

In cart or car thou never reestit ; 

The steyest brae thou wad hae faced it ; 

Thou never lap, and sten't, and breastit, 

Then stood to blaw ; 
But just thy step a wee thing hastit, 

Thou snoov't awa. 



THE AULD FARMER'S MARE, 179 



My pleugh is now thy bairn-time a' : 
Four gallant brutes as e'er did draw ; 
Forbye sax mae, I've sell't awa', 

That thou hast nurst : 
They drew me thretteen puiid and twa, 

The vera warst. 

Mony a sair darg we twa hae wrought, 
And wi' the weary warl' fought ! 
And mony an anxious day I thought 

We wad be beat ! 
Yet here to crazy age we're brought, 

Wi' something yet. 

And think na, my auld, trusty servan', 
That now perhaps thou's less deservin', 
And thy auld days may end in starvin', 

For my last fou, 
A heapit stimpart, 1*11 reserve ane 

Laid by for you. 

We've worn to crazy years thegither ; 
We'll toyte about wi' ane anither ; 
Wi' tentie care I'll flit thy tether 

To some hain'd rig, 
Whare ye may nobly rax your leather, 

Wi' sma' fatigue. 



i8o TO A MOUSE. 



TO A MOUSE, 

ON TURNING UP HER NEST WITH THE PLOUGH, 
NOVEMBER, 1785. 

WEE, sleekit, cowrin', tim'rous beastie, 
Oh, what a panic's in thy breastie 1 
Thou needna start awa' sae hasty, 

Wi' bickering brattle ! 
I wad be laith to rin and chase thee, 

Wi* murd'ring pattle ! 

I'm truly sorry man's dominion 
Has broken Nature's social union, 
And justifies that ill opinion 

Which maks thee startle 
At me, thy poor earth-born companion, 

And fellow-mortal ! 

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve ; 
What then ? poor beastie, thou maun live ! 
A daimen-icker in a thrave 

'S a sma' request : 
I'll get a blessin' wi' the lave, 

And never miss't ! 

Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin ! 
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin' 1 
And naething, now, to big a new ane, 

0' foggage green ! 
And bleak December's winds eusuin*, 

Baith snell and keen ! 

Thou saw the fields laid bare and waste, 
And weary winter comin' fast, 



And cosie here, beneath the blast, 

Thou thought to dwell, 

Till, crash ! the cruel coulter past 

Out through thy cell. 

That wee bit heap o' leaves and stibble 
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble ! 
Now thou's turn'd out for a* thy trouble, 

But house or hauld. 
To thole the winter's sleety dribble, 

And cranreuch cauld ! 

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane, 
In proving foresight may be vain : 
The best laid schemes o' mice and men 

Gang alt a-gley. 
And lea'e us nought but grief and pain 

For promised joy. 

Still thou art blest, compared wi' me ! 
The present only toucheth thee : 
But, och ! I backward cast my e*e 

On prospects drear ! 
And forward, though I canna see, 

I guess and fear ! 



A WINTER NIGHT. 

WHEN biting Boreas, fell and doure, 
Sharp shivers through the leafless bower ; 
When Phoebus gies a short-lived glower 

Far south the lift. 
Dim- darkening through the flaky shower, 
Or whirling drift : 



1 82 A WINTER NIGHT. 



Ae night the storm the steeples rocked, 
Poor labour sweet in sleep was locked, 
While burns, wi' snawy w^reaths up-choked, 

Wild-eddying swirl, 
Or through the mining outlet bocked, 

Down headlong hurl. 

List'ning the doors and winnocks rattle, 
I thought me on the ourie cattle, 
Or silly sheep, wha bide this brattle 

0' winter war, 
And through the drift, deep-lairing sprattle, 

Beneath a scaur. 

Ilk happing bird, wee, helpless thing ! 
That, in the merry months o' spring, 
Delighted me to hear thee sing, 

What comes o' thee ? 
Whare wilt thou cower thy chittering wing, 

And close thy e'e ? 

Even you, on murdering errands toil'd, 

Lone from 3'^our savage homes exiled, 

The blood-stain'd roost, and sheep-cot spoil'd, 

My heart forgets, 
While pitiless the tempest wild 

Sore on you beats. 

Now Phoebe, in her midnight reign, 
Dark muffled, view'd the dreary plain ; 
Still crowding thoughts, a pensive train, 

Rose in my soul, 
When on my ear this plaintive strain, 

Slow, solemn, stole — 



A WINTER NIGHT. 183 i 

— — \ 

i 

** Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust ! | 

And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost ! \ 

Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows ! 

Not all your rage, as now united, shows 

More hard un kindness, unrelenting, 

Vengeful malice, un repenting, 

Than heaven-illumin'd man on brother man bestows ! 

** See stern Oppression's iron grip, 
Or mad Ambition's gory hand, 
Sending, like blood-hounds from the slip, 
Woe, Want, and Murder o'er a laud 1 
Even in the peaceful rural vale. 
Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale, 
How pamper'd Luxury, Flattery by her side. 
The parasite empoisoning her ear. 
With all the servile wretches in the rear, 
Looks o'er proud Property, extended wide ; 
And eyes the simple rustic hind. 

Whose toil upholds the glittering show, 
A creature of another kind. 
Some coarser substance unrefined. 
Placed for her lordly use thus far, thus vile, below ! 

** Where, where is Love's fond, tender throe, 
With lordly Honour's lofty brow. 

The powers you proudly own ? 
Is there, beneath Love's noble name, 
Can harbour, dark, the selfish aim, 

To bless himself alone ! 
Mark maiden innocence a prey 

To love-pretending snares, 
This boasted Honour turns away. 
Shunning soft Pity's rising sway, 



Recrardless of the tears and unavailing prayers 1. 
Perhaps, this hour, in misery's squalid nest, 
She strains j'-our infant to her joyless breast, 

And with a mother's fears shrinks at the rocking blast ! 

* * ye who, sunk in beds of down, 
Feel not a want but what yourselves create, 
Think for a moment on his wretched fate 

Whom friends and fortune quite disown ! 
Ill satisfied keen nature's clamorous call, 

Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to sleep, 
While through the ragged roof and chinky wall, 

Chill o'er his slumbers piles the drifty heap ! 
Think on the dungeon's grim confine, 
Where Guilt and poor Misfortune pine ! 

Guilt, erring man, relenting view ! 

But shall thy legal rage pursue 

The wretch, already crushed low 

By cruel Fortune's undeserved blow ? 
Affliction's sons are brothers in distress, 
A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss ! " 

I heard na mair, for chanticleer 

Shook off the pouthery snaw. 
And hail'd the morning wi' a cheer — 

A cottage-rousing craw. 

But deep this truth impressed my mind — 

Through all His works abroad, 
The heart benevolent and kind 

The most resembles God. 



EPISTLE TO DAVIE. 185 



VERSES TO AN OLD SWEETHEART AFTER 
HER MARRIAGE. 

WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAF OF A COPY OF HIS 
POEMS PRESENTED TO HER. 

ONCE fondly loved, and still remember'd dear, 
Sweet early object of my youthful vows ! 
Accept this mark of friendship, warm, sincere — 
Friendship ! — 'tis all cold duty now allows. 

And when you read the simple, artless rhymes, 
One friendly sigh for him — he asks no more — 

Who distant burns in flaming torrid climes. 
Or haply lies beneath th' Atlantic's roar. 



EPISTLE TO DAVIE, 

A BROTHER POET. 

WHILE winds frae aff Ben Lomond blaw, 
And bar the doors wi' driving snaw, 

And hing us owre the ingle, 
I set me down to pass the time, 
And spin a verse or twa o' rhyme, 

In hamely, westlin' jingle. 
While frosty winds blaw in the drift, 

Ben to the chimla lug, 
I grudge a wee the great folk's gift, 

That live sae bien and snug : 



1 86 EPISTLE TO DAVIE. 



I tent less, and want less 

Their roomy fireside ; 
But hanker and canker 

To see their cursed pride. 

It's hardly in a body's pow'r 

To keep, at times, frae being sour, 

To see how things are shar'd ; 
How best o' chiels are whiles in want. 
While coofs on countless thousands rant, 

And ken iia how to wair't ; 
But, Davie, lad, ne'er fash your head, 

Though we hae little gear, 
We're fit to win our daily bread, 
As lang's we're hale and fier : 
**Mair spier na, nor fear na," 
Auld age ne'er mind a feg, 
The last o't, the warst o't, 
Is only but to beg. 

To lie in kilns and barns at e'en, 

When banes are crazed, and bluid is thin, 

Is doubtless great distress ! 
Yet then content could make us blest ; 
E'en then, sometimes, we'd snatch a taste 

Of truest happiness. 
The honest heart that's free frae a' 

Intended fraud or guile. 
However Fortune kick the ba', 
Has aye some cause to smile : 
And mind still, you'll find still, 

A comfort this nae sma' ; 
Nae mair then, we'll care then, 
Nae farther can we fa'. 



EPISTLE TO DAVIE, 187 



What though, like commoners of air, 
We wander out, we know not where, 

But either house or hall ? 
Yet nature's charms — the hills and wooud, 
The sweeping vales, and foaming floods — 

Are free alike to all. 
In days when daisies deck the ground, 

And blackbirds whistle clear, 
W^ith honest joy our hearts will bound 
To see the coming year : 

On braes, when we please, then, 

We'll sit and sowth a tune : 
Syne rhyme till't, we'll time till't, 
And sing't when we has dune. 

It's no in titles nor in rank ; 

It's no in wealth like Lon'on bank, 

To purchase peace and rest : 
It's no in making muckle mair ; 
It's no in books ; it's no in lear, 

To make us truly blest : 
If happiness has not her seat 

And centre in the breast, 
AVe may be wise, or rich, or great, 
But never can be blest : 
Nae treasures, nor pleasures, 

Could make us happy lang ; 
The heart aye's the part aye 
That makes us right or wrang. 

Think ye, that sic as you and I, 
Wha drudge and drive through wet and dry, 
Wi' never-ceasing toil ; 



Think ye, are we less blest than they 
Wha scarcely tent us in their way, 

As hardly worth their while ? 

Alas ! how aft in haughty mood, 

God's creatures they oppress ! 

Or else, neglecting a' that's guid. 

They riot in excess ! 

Baith careless and fearless 

Of either heaven or hell ! 
Esteeming and deeming 
It's a' an idle tale ! 



Then let us cheerfu' acquiesce ; 
Nor make our scanty pleasures less, 

By pining at our state ; 
And, even should misfortunes come, 
I, here wha sit, hae met wi' some, 

An's thankfu' for them yet. 
They gie the wit of age to youth ; 

They let us ken oursel ; 
They make us see the naked truth, 
The real guid and ill. 
Though losses and crosses 
Be lessons right severe, 
There's wit there, ye'll get there, 
Ye'll find nae other where. 

But tent me, Davie, ace o' hearts ! 

(To say aught less wad wrang the cartes. 

And flattery I detest) 
This life has joys for you and I ; 
And joys that riches ne'er could buy ; 

And joys the very best. 



EPISTLE TO DAVIE, 189 



There's a' the pleasures o' the heart, 

The lover and the Men' ; 
Ye hae your Meg, your dearest part, 
And I my darling Jean ! 
It warms me, it charms me, 

To mention but her name : 
It heats me, it beets me, 
And sets me a' on flame ! 

Oh, all ye powers who rule above ! 
Thou, whose very self art love ! 

Thou know'st my words sincere ! 
The life-blood streaming through my heart, 
Or my more dear immortal part, 

Is not more fondly dear ! 
When heart-corroding care and grief 

Deprive my soul of rest, 
Her dear idea brings relief 
And solace to my breast. 
Thou Being, all-seeing, 

Oh, hear my fervent prayer ! 
Still take her, and make her 
Thy most peculiar care ! 

All hail, ye tender feelings dear ! 
The smile of love, the friendly tear. 

The sym]:)athetic glow ! 
Long since, this world's thorny ways 
Had number'd out my weary days, 

Had it not been for you ! 
Fate still has blest me with a friend, 

In every care and ill ; 
And oft a more endearing band, 

A tie more tender still. 



It lightens, it brightens 

The tenebrific scene, 
To meet with, and greet with 

My Davie or my Jean ! 

Oh, how that name inspires my style ! 
The words come skelpin*, rank and file, 

Amaist before I ken ! 
The ready measure rins as fine 
As Phoebus and the famous Nine 

Were glowerin' owre my pen. 
My spaviet Pegasus will limp, 

Till ance he's fairly het ; 
And then he'll hilch, and stilt, and jimp, 
And rin an unco fit : 
But lest then, the beast then, 
Should rue this hasty ride, 
I'll light now, and dight now 
His sweaty, wizen'd hide. 



LAMENT, 

OCCASIONED BY THE UNFORTUNATE ISSUE OF A FRIENO's 
AMOUR. 

OTHOTJ pale orb, that silent shines, 
While care-untroubled mortals sleep ! 
Thou seest a wretch that inly pines, 

And wanders here to wail and weep ! 
With woe I nightly vigils keep 

Beneath thy wan, unwarming beam ; 
And mourn, in lamentation deep. 
How life and love are all a dream. 



LAMENT. 191 



I joyless view thy rays adorn 

The faintly-markM, distant hill : 
I joyless view thy trembling horn. 

Reflected in the gurgling rill : 
My fondly-fluttering heart, be still ! 

Thou busy power, Remembrance, cease ! 
Ah ! must the agonising thrill 

For ever bar returning peace ! 

No idly-feign'd poetic pains, 

My sad, love-lorn lamen tings claim ; 
No shepherd's pipe — Arcadian strains ; 

No fabled tortures, quaint and tame : 
The plighted faith ; the mutual flame ; 

The oft-attested powers above ; 
The promised father's tender name ; 

These were the pledges of my love ! 

Encircled in her clasping arms. 

How have the raptured moments flown I 
How have I wish'd for fortune's charms, 

For her dear sake, and hers alone 1 
And must I think it ! — is she gone, 

My secret heart's exulting boast % 
And does she heedless hear my groan ? 

And is she ever, ever lost ? 

Oh ! can she bear so base a heart, 

So lost to honour, lost to truth, 
As from the fondest lover part. 

The plighted husband of her youth t 
Alas ! life's path may be unsmooth ! 

Her way may lie through rough distress 1 
Then, who her pangs and pains will soothe, 

Her sorrows share, and make them less ? 



Ye winged hours that o'er us pass'd, 

Enraptured more, the more enjoy'd, 
Your dear remembrance in my breast, 

My fondly-treasured thoughts employed. 
That breast, how dreary now, and void, 

For her too scanty once of room ! 
Even every ray of hope destroy'd, 

And not a wish to gild the gloom ! 

The morn that warns th' approaching day 

Awakes me up to toil and woe : 
I see the hours in long array. 

That I must suffer, lingering, slow. 
Full many a pang, and many a throe, 

Keen recollection's direful train, 
Must wring my soul, ere Phoebus, low, 

Shall kiss the distant, western main. 

And when my nightly couch I try, 

Sore harass'd out with care and grief, 
My toil-beat nerves, and tear-worn eye, 

Keep watchings with the nightly thief ; 
Or if I slumber, fancy, chief, 

Reigns haggard- wild, in sore affright : 
Even day, all-bitter, brings relief, 

From such a horror-breathing night. 

! thou bright Queen, who o'er th' expanse, 

Now highest reign'st, with boundless sway ! 
Oft has thy silent-marking glance 

Observed us, fondly wandering, stray ! 
The time, unheeded, sped away, 

While love's luxurious pulse beat high, 
Beneath thy silver-gleaming ray, 

To mark the mutual-kindling eye. 



DESPONDENCY, 193 



Oh ! scenes in strong remembrance set ! 

Scenes, never, never to return ! 
Scenes, if in stupor I forget, 

Again I feel, again I burn ! 
From every joy and pleasure torn, 

Life's weary vale I'll wander through ; 
And hopeless, comfortless, I'll mourn 

A faithless woman's broken vow. 



DESPONDENCY 1 

AN ODE. 

OPPRESS'D with grief, oppress'd with care^ 
A burden more than I can bear, 
I set me down and sigh : 
life ! thou art a galling load, 
Along a rough, a weary road. 

To wretches such as I ! 
Dim, backward, as I cast my view, 

What sickening scenes appear ! 
What sorrows yet may pierce me through, 
Too justly I may fear ! 
Still caring, despairing, 

Must be my bitter doom : 
My woes here shall close ne'er, 
But with the closing tomb ! 

Happy, ye sons of busy life, 
Who, equal to the bustling strife, 
No other view regard ! 



194 DESPONDENCY, 



Even when the wished end's denied. 
Yet while the busy means are plied, 

They bring their own reward : 
Whilst I, a hope-abandon'd wight, 

Unfitted with an aim, 
Meet every sad returning night 
And joyless morn the same ; 
You, bustling, andjustling. 

Forget each grief and pain ; 
I, listless, yet restless. 
Find every prospect vain. 

How blest the Solitary's lot, 
Who, all-forgetting, all-forgot, 

Within his humble cell, 
The cavern wild with tangling roots, 
Sits o'er his newly-gather'd fruits, 

Beside his crystal well ! 
Or, haply, to his evening thought, 

By unfrequented stream, 
The ways of men are distant brought, 
A faint collected dream ; 
AVhile praising, and raising 

His thoughts to Heaven on high, 
As, wand'ring, meand'ring. 
He views the solemn sky. 

Than I, no lonely hermit placed 
Where never human footstep traced. 

Less fit to play the part ; 
The lucky moment to improve. 
And just to stop, and just to move, 

With self-respecting art : 



VERSES TO MY BED. 195 



But, ah ! those pleasures, loves, and joys 

Which I too keenly taste, 
The Solitary can despise, 
Can want, and yet be blest ! 
He needs not, he heeds not, 

Or human love or hate, 
Whilst I here must cvj here 
At perfid}^ ingrate ! 

Oh ! enviable, early days^ 

When dancing thoughtless pleasure's maze 

To care, to guilt unknown ! 
How ill exchanged for riper times, 
To feel the follies, or the crimes, 

Of others, or my own ! 
Ye tiny elves that guiltless sport, 

Like linnets in the bush, 
Ye little know the ills ye court, 
When manhood is your wish ! 
The losses, the crosses, 

That active man engage 1 
The fears all, the tears all, 
Of dim declining age ! 



VERSES TO MY BED. 

THOU bed, in which I first began 
To be that various creature — man ! 
And when again the fates decree. 
The place where I must cease to be — 
When sickness comes, to whom I fly 
To soothe my pain or close mine eye — 



196 WINTER. 



When cares surround me, where I weep, 
Or lose them all in balmy sleep — 
When sore with labour, whom I court, 
And to thy downy breast resort — 
Where, too, ecstatic joys I find, 
When deigns my Delia to be kind ; 
And full of love, in all her charms, 
Thou giv'st the fair one to m}^ arms : 
The centre tliou, where griof and pain, 
Disease and rest, alternate reign. 
Oh, since within thy little space 
So many various scenes take, place ; 
Lessons as useful shalt thou teach, 
As sages dictate — cluirchmeu preach ; 
And man, convinced by thee alone, 
Tliia great important truth shall own, 
That thin partitions do divide 
The bounds where good and ill reside ; 
That nought is perfect here below; 
But liliss still bordering upon wot. 



WINTER : 

A DIRGE. 

THE wintry west extends his blast, 
And hail and rain does blaw ; 
Or the stormy north sends driving forth 

The blinding sleet and snaw : 
While tumbling brown, the burn comes down, 

And roars frae bank to brae ; 
And bird and beast in covert rest, 
And pass the heartless day. 



r-MvM^l 



MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN. 197 



*' The sweeping blast, the sky o'ercast," 

The joyless winter day, 
Let others fear, to nie more dear 

Than all the pride of May : 
The tempest's howl, it soothes my suul, 

My griefs it seems to join ; 
The leafless trees my fancy please, 

Their fate resembles mine ! 

Thou Power Supreme, whose mighty scheme 

These woes of mine fulfil. 
Here, firm, I rest, they must be best, 

Because they* are Thy will ! 
Then all I want (oh, do Thou grant 

This one request of mine !) 
Since to enjoy Thou dost deny, 

Assist me to resign. 



MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN. 

A DIRGE. 

WHEN chill November's surly blast 
Made fields and forests bare, 
One evening, as I wander'd forth 

Along the banks of Ayr, 
I spied a man whose aged step 

Seem'd weary, worn with care ; 
His face was furrow'd o'er with years, 
And hoary was his hair. 



I ' ' ' ' 

198 MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN. 



*' Young stranger, whither wand'rest tliou ? 

Began the reverend sage ; 
"Does thirst of wealth thy step constrain, 

Or youthful pleasures rage ? 
Or, haply, prest with cares and woes, 

Too soon thou hast began 
To wander forth, with me, to mourn 

The miseries of man. 

** The sun that overhangs yon moors, 

Outspreading far and wide, 
Where hundreds labour to support 

A haughty lordling's pride : 
I've seen yon weary winter sun 

Twice forty times return, 
And every time has added proofs 

That man was made to mourn. 

' ' man ! while in thy early years, 

How prodigal of time ! 
Misspending all thy precious hours, 

Thy glorious youthful prime ! 
Alternate follies take the sway ; 

Licentious passions burn ; 
Which tenfold force gives nature's law, 

That man was made to mourn. 

" Look not alone on youthful prime. 

Or manhood's active might ; 
Man then is useful to his kind, 

Supported is his right : 
But see him on the edge of life. 

With cares and sorrows worn ; 
Then age and want — oh, ill-matched pair !- 

Show man was made to mourn. 



/ 



MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN. 199 



"A few seem favourites of fate, 

In pleasure's lap carest ; 
Yet think not all the rich and great 

Are likewise truly blest. 
But, oh ! wliat crowds in every land 

Ave wretched and forlorn ! 
Through weary life this lesson learn — 

That man was made to mourn. 

** Many and sharp the numerous ills 

Inwoven with our frame ! 
More pointed still we make ourselves — 

Regret, remorse, and shame ! 
And man, whose heaven-erected face 

The smiles of love adorn, 
Man's inhumanity to man 

Makes countless thousands mourn ! 



" See yonder poor, o'erlabour'd wight, 

So abject, mean, and vile, 
Who begs a brother of the earth 

To give him leave to toil ; 
And see his lordly fellow-worm 

The poor petition spurn, 
Unmindful, though a weeping wife 

And helpless oft'spring mourn, 

*' If I'm design'd yon lordling's slave— 

By nature's law design'd — 
Wliy was an independent wish 

E'er planted in my mind ? 
If not, why am I subject to 

His cruelty or scorn ? 
Or why has man the will and power 

To make his fellow mourn ? 



200 ON THE ILLNESS OF A CHILD. 



"Yet let not this too much, my son, 

Disturb thy youthful breast ; 
This partial view of humankind 

Is surely not the last ! 
The poor, oppressed, honest man. 

Had never, sure, been born, 
Had there not been some recompense 

To comfort those that mourn. 

" Death ! the poor man's dearest friend- 

The kindest and the best ! 
Welcome the hour my aged limbs 

Are laid with thee at rest ! 
The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow, 

From pomp and pleasure torn ; 
But, oh ! a blest relief to those 

That weary-laden mourn ! " 



ON THE ILLNESS OF A FAVOURITE CHILD. 

NOW health forsakes that angel face, 
Nae mair my dearie smiles ; 
Pale sickness withers ilka grace, 
And a' my hopes beguiles. 

The cruel Powers reject the prayer 

I hourly mak for thee I 
Ye heavens, how great is my despair, 

How can I see him die 1 



A PRAYER, 20I 



A PRAYER 

IN THE PROSPECT OF DEATH. 

OTHOU unknown, Almighty Cause 
Of all my hope and fear ! 
In whose dread presence, ere an hour, 
Perhaps I must appear ! 

If I have wander' d in those paths 

Of life I ought to shun ; 
As something, loudly, in my breast, 

Remonstrates I have done ; 

Thou know'st that Thou hast formed me 
With passions wild and strong ; 

And listening to their witching voice 
Has often led me wrong. 

AVhere human weakness has come short, 

Or frailty stept aside. 
Do Thou, All-Good ! for such Thou art, 

In shades of darkness hide. 

Where with intention I have err'd, 

No other plea I have, 
But, Thou art good ; and goodness still 

Delighteth to forgive. 



202 STANZAS. 

STANZAS 

ON THE SAME OCCASION. 

WHY aui I loatli to leave this earthly scene ? 
Have I so found it full of pleasing charms ? 
Some drops of joy with draughts of ill between : 

Some gleams of sunshine 'mid renewing storms ; 
Is it departing pangs my soul alarms ? 

Or death's unlovely, dreary, dark abode ? 
For guilt, for guilt, my terrors are in arms : 

I tremble to approach an angr}' God, 
And justly smart beneath His sin-avenging rod. 

Fain would I say, *' Forgive my foul offence ! '* 

Fain promise never more to disobey ; 
But should my Author health again dispense, 

Again I might desert fair virtue's way ; 
Again in folly's path might go astray ; 

Again exalt the brute and sink the man ; 
Then how should I for heavenly mercy pray, 

Who act so counter heavenly mercy's plan ? 
Wlio sin so oft have mourn'd, yet to temptation ran ? 

Thou great Governor of all below ! 

If I may dare a lifted eye to Thee, 
Thy nod can make the tempest cease to blow, 

Or still the tumult of the raging sea : 
With that controlling power assist even me, 

Those headlong furious passions to confine, 
For all unfit I feel my powers to be, 

To rule their torrent in the allow'd line : 
Oh, aid me with Thy help, Omnipotence Divine ! 



A PRAYER, 



A PRAYER, 

LEFT BY THE AUTHOR AT A REVEREND FRIEND's HOUSE, 
IN THE ROOM WHERE HE SLEPT. 

OTHOU dread Power, who reign'st above ! 
I know Thou wilt me hear, 
When for this scene of peace and love 
I make my prayer sincere. 

The hoary sire — the mortal stroke, 

Long, long, be pleased to spare : 
To bless his filial little flock, 

And show what good men are. 

She, who her lovely otfspriug eyes 

With tender hopes and fears, 
Oh, bless her with a mother's joys, 

But spare a mother's tears ! 

Their hope — their stay — their darling youth, 

In manhood's dawning blusli — 
Bless him, Thou GoD of love and truth, 

Up to a parent's wish ! 

The beauteous seraph sister-band, 
With earnest tears I pray, 

Tliou know'st the snares on every hand- 
Guide Thou their steps alway ! 

When soon or late they reach that coast,. 

O'er life's rough ocean driven, 
May they rejoice, no wanderer lost, 

A family in heaven ! 



204 THE FIRS T PSA L M. 



THE FIRST PSALM. 

THE man, in life wherever placed, 
Hath happiness in store. 
Who walks not in the wicked's ways 
Nor learns their guilty lore ! 

Nor from the seat of scornful pride 
Casts forth his eyes abroad, 

But with humility and awe 
Still walks before his God. 

That man shall flourish like the trees 
Which by the streamlets grow ; 

The fruitful top is spread on high, 
And firm the root below. 

But he whose blossom buds in guilt 
Shall to the ground be cast. 

And, like the rootless stubble, tost 
Before the sweeping blast. 

For why ? that God the good ador? 

Hath given them peace and rest, 
But hath decreed that wicked men 

Shall ne'er be truly blest. 



^ 4\» ^ JJW^* 



VERSES. 205 

A PRAYER, 

UNDEK THE PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH. 

OTHOU great Being ! what Thou art 
Surpasses me to know : 
Yet sure I am, that known to Thee 
Are all Thy works below. 

Thy creature here before Thee stands, 

All wretched and distrest ; 
Yet sure those ills that wring my soul 

Obey Thy high behest. 

Sure, Thou, Almighty, canst not act 

From cruelty or wrath ! 
Oh, free my weary eyes from tears, 

Or close them fast in death 1 

But if I must afflicted be, . 

To suit some wise design ; 
Then man my soul with firm resolve, 

To bear and not repine ! 



VERSES WRITTEN UNDER VIOLENT GRIEF. 

ACCEPT the gift a friend sincere 
Wad on thy worth be pressin' ; 
Remembrance oft may start a tear, 
But oh ! that tenderness forbear. 
Though 'twad my sorrows lessen. 



2o6 THE NINETIETH PSALM. 



My morning raise sae clear and fair, 

I thought sair storms wad never 
Bedew the scene ; but grief and care 
In wildest fury hae made bare 
My peace, ray hope, for ever ! 

You think I'm glad ; oh, I pay weel 

For a' the joy I borrow, 
In solitude — then, then I feel 
I canna to myself conceal 

My deeply-ranklin' sorrow. 

Farewell ! within thy bosom free 

A sigh may whiles awaken ; 
A tear may wet thy laughin' e'e. 
For Scotia's son — ance gay like thee — 
Now hopeless, comfortless, forsaken ! 



THE FIRST SIX VERSES OF THE NINETIETH 
PSALM. 

OTHOU, the first, the greatest friend 
Of all the human race ! 
Whose strong right hand has ever been 
Their stay and dwelling-place ! 

Before the mountains heaved their heads 

Beneath Thy forming hand. 
Before this ponderous globe itself 

Arose at Thy command ; 



TO A YOUNG LADY, 207 



That Power which raised and still upholds 

This universal frame, 
From countless, unbeginning time, 

Was ever still the same. 

Those mightj^ periods of years 

Which seem to us so vast, 
Appear no more before Thy sight 

Than j^esterday that's past. 

Thou givest the word : Thy creature, man, 

Is to existence brought ; 
Again Thou say'st, "Ye sons of men, 

Return ye into nought ! " 

Tliou layest them, with all their cares, 

In everlasting sleep ; 
As with a flood Thou tak'st them ofl* 

With overwhelming sweep. 

They flourish like the morning flower. 

In beauty's pride array'd ; 
But long ere night cut down, it lies 

All withered and decay'd. 



TO A YOUNG LADY IN CHURCH. 

FAIR maid, you need not take the hint, 
Nor idle texts pursue ; 
'Twas guilty sinners that he meant^ 
Not angels such as you ! 



TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY, 

ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH IN 
APRIL 1786. 

WEE, modest, crirason-tippM flower, 
Thou's met me in an evil hour ; 
For I maun crush amang the stoure 
Thy slender stem : 
To spare thee now is past my power, 
Thou bonny gem. 

Alas ! it's no thy neibor sweet, 
The bonny lark, companion meet, 
Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet, 

Wi' speckled breast, 
When upward springing, blithe, to greet 

The purpling east 

Cauld blew the bitter-biting north 
Upon thy early, humble, birth ; 
Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth 

Amid the storm, 
Scarce rear'd above the parent earth 

Thy tender form. 

The flaunting flowers our gardens yield, 
High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield ; 
But thou, beneath the random bield 

0' clod or stane, 
Adorns the histie stibble-field, 

Unseen, alane. 

There, in thy scanty mantle clad. 
Thy snawie bosom sun-ward spread, 



TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY. 209 



Thou lifts thy unassuming head 

In humble guise ; 

But now the share uptears thy bed, 
And low thou lies ! 

Such is the fate of artless maid, 
Sweet floweret of the rural shade ! 
By love's simplicity betray'd, 

And guileless trust, 
Till she, like thee, all soil'd, is laid 

Low i' the dust. 

Such is the fate of simple bard. 

On life's rough ocean luckless starr d ! 

Unskilful he to note the card 

Of prudent lore, 
Till billows rage, and gales blow hard, 

And whelm him o'er ! 

Such fate to suffering worth is given, 

Who long with wants aud woes has striven. 

By human pride or cunning driven, 

To misery's brink, 
Till, wrench'd of every stay but Heaven, 

He, ruin'd, sink ! 

Even thou who mourn'st the Daisy's fate, 
That fate is thine — no distant date ; 
Stern Ruin's ploughshare drives, elate, 

Full on thy Moom, 
Till, crush'd beneath the furrow's weight, 

Shall be thy doom ! 



Go 



2IO ODE TO RUIN. 



ODE TO RUIN. 

ALL hail ! inexorable lord !• 
At whose destruction-breathing word 
The mightiest empires fall ! 
Thy cruel, woe-delighted train, 
The ministers of grief and pain, 

A sullen welcome, all ! 
With stern-resolved, despairing eye, 

I see each aim^d dart ; 
For one has cut my dearest tie, 
And quivers in my heart. 
Then lowering, and pouring, 

The storm no more I dread ; 
Though thick'ning and black'ning, 
Round my devoted head. 

And thou grim power, by life abhorr'd, 
While life a pleasure can afford, 
Oh ! hear a wretch's prayer ! 
No m.ore I shrink appall' d, afraid ; 
I court, I beg thy friendly aid 
To close this scene of care ! 
When shall my soul, in silent peace, 

Resign life's joyless day : 
My weary ln>art its throbbings cease, 
Cold niouldering in the clay ? 
No fear more, no tear more, 
To stain my lifeless face ; 
Enclasped, and grasped 
Within thy cold embrace I 



VERSES. 211 

VERSES 

ON THE DESTRrCTION OF THE WOODS NEAK DKHMLANHTa. 

AS on the banks o' wandering Nith 
Ae smiling summer morn I strayed, 
And traced its bonny howes and haughs, 

Where Unties sang and lambkins play'd, 
I sat me down upon a craig, 

And drank my fill o* fancy's dream, 
When, from the eddying deep below, 
[Jprose the genius of the stream. 

Dark, like the frowning rock, his brow, 
' And troubled like his wintry wave, 
And deep, as sughs the boding wind 

Amang his eaves, the sigh he gave — 
** And came ye here, my son," he cried, 

*' To wander in my birken shade ? 
To muse some favourite Scottish theme, 

Or sing some favourite Scottish maid ! 

*' There was a time, it's nae lang syne. 

Ye might hae seen me in my pride. 
When a' my banks sae bravely saw 

Their woody pictures in my tide ; 
When hanging beech and spreading elm 

Shaded my stream sae clear and cool ; 
And stately oaks their twisted arms 

Threw broad and dark across the pool ; 

'* When glinting through the trees appear' d 
1 he wee white cot aboon the mill, 

And peacefu' rose its ingle reek. 
That slowly curled up the hilh 



212 TO MISS LOGAN, 



But DOW the cot is bare and caald, 
Its branchy shelter's lost and gane, 

And scarce a stinted birk is left 
To shiver in the blast its lane." 

*' Alas ! " said I, " what ruefu' chance 

Has twin'd ye o' your stately trees ? 
Has laid your rocky bosom hare ? 

Has stripp'd the deeding o' your brae.s ? 
AVas it the bitter eastern blast, 

That scatters blight in early spring ? 
Or was't the wil'-fire scorch'd their boui;]i.s, 

Or canker-worm wi* secret sting? " 

" Xae eastlin blast," the sprite replied ; 

'* It blew na here sae fierce and fell ; 
And on my dry and halesome banks 

Xae canker-worms get leave to dwell : 
Man ! cruel man ! " the genius sigh'd — 

As through the cliffs he sank him down- 
•' The worm that gnaw'd my bonny trees, 

That reutilc wears a ducal crown ! " 



TO MISS LOGAN, 

^VITH beattie's poems as a new-year's gift, 
IST JAN. 1787. 

AGAIN the silent wheels of time 
Their annual round have driven, 
And you, though scarce in maiden prime, 
Are so m.uch nearer heaven. 



EPISTLE TO A YOUNG FRIEND. 213 



Xo gifts have I from Indian coasts 

The infant year to hail ; 
I send you more than India boasts, 

In Edwin's simple tale. 

Our sez with guile and faithless love 
Is charged, perhaps, too true ; 

But may, dear maid, each lover prove 
An Edwin still to you ! 



EPISTLE TO A YOUNG FRIEND. 

I LANG hae thought, my youthfu' frien<l, 
A something to have sent you, 
Though it should serve nae other end 

Than just a kind memento ; 
But how the subject- theme may gang, 

Let time and chance determine ; 
Perhaps it may turn out a sang, 
Perhaps turn out a sermon. 

Ye'll try the world fu' soon, my la^l, 

And, Andrew dear, believe me, 
You'll find mankind an unco* squad, 

And muckle they may grieve ye : 
For care and trouble set your thought, 

Even when your end's attain'd ; 
And a' your views may come to nought, 

Where every nerve is strain'd. 

I'll no say men are villains a' ; 

The real, harden'd wicked, 
Wha hae nae check but human law, 

Are to a few restricked ; 



214 EPISTLE TO A YOUNG FRIEND, 



But, och ! inaukind are uuco weak, 

And little to be trusted ; 
If self the wavering balance shake, 

It's rarely right adjusted ! 

Yet they wha fa' in fortune's strife, 

Their fate we shouldna censure, 
For still the important end of life 

They equally may answer ; 
A man may hae au honest heart, 

Though poortith hourly staro him ; 
A man may tak a neibor's pai t, 

Yet hae nae cash to spare liiniu 

Aye free, aff-han' your story teli. 

When wi' a bosom crony ; 
But still keep something to yoursel 

Ye scarcely tell to ony. 
Conceal yoursel as weel's ye can 

Frae critical dissection ; 
But keek through every other man, 

Wi' sharpen' d, sly inspection. 

The sacred lowe o' weel-placed love, 

Luxuriantly indulge it ; 
But never tempt the illicit rove, 

Though naething should divulge it '. 
I waive the quantum o' the sin, 

The hazard o' concealing ; 
But, och ! it hardens a' within, 

And petrifies the feeling ! 

To catch Dame Fortune's golden smile. 

Assiduous wait upon her ; 
And gather gear by every wile 

That's justified by honour; 



Not for to hide it in a hedge, 

Nor for a train attendant ; 
But for the glorious privilege 

Of being independent. 

The fear o' hell's a hangman's whip 
To haud the wretch in order ; 

But where you feel your honour grip, 
Let that aye be your border : 

Its slightest touches, instant pause- 
Debar a' side pretences ; 

And resolutely keep its laws, 
Uncaring consequences. 

The great Creator to revere 

Must sure become the creature 
But still the preaching cant forbear, 

And even the rigid feature : 
Yet ne'er with wits profane to range, 

Be complaisance extended ; 
An athiest-laugh's a poor exchange 

For Deity offended ! 

When ranting round in Pleasure's ling, 

Religion may be blinded ; 
Or if she gie a random sting, 

It may be little minded ; 
But when on life we're tempest-driven, 

A conscience but a canker — 
A correspondence fix'd wi' Heaven 

Is sure a noble anchor ! 

Adieu, dear, amiable youth ! 

Your heart can ne'er be wanting 1 
May prudence, fortitude, and truth, 

Erect your brow undaunting ! 



2i6 VERSES ON A SCOTCH BARD, 



In ploughman phrase, *'God send you speed," 

Still daily to grow wiser ; 
And may you better reck the rede 

Than ever did th' adviser ! 



YERSES ON A SCOTCH BARD, 

GONE TO THE WEST INDIES. 

A' YE wha live by sowps o' drink, 
A' ye wha live by crambo-clink, 
A' ye wha live and never think, 

Come mourn wi' me ! 
Our billie's gien us a' a jink, 

And owre the sea. 

Lament him a' ye rantin* core, 
^Yha dearly like a random-splore, 
Xae mair he'll join the merry roar 

In social key ; 
For now he's taen anither shore, 

And owre the sea ! 

The bonny lasses weel may wiss him, 
And in their dear petitions place him ; 
The widows, wives, and a' may bless him, 

Wi' tearfu' e'e ; 
For weel I wat they'll sairlj^ miss him 

That's owre the sea ! 

Fortune, they hae room to grumble ! 
Hadst thou ta'en atf some drowsy bummle. 



VERSES ON A SCOTCH BARD. 217 



Wha can do nought but fyke and fumble, 
'Twad been nae plea ; 

But he was gleg as ony wumble, 

That's owre the sea ! 

Auld, cantie Kyle may weepers wear, 
And stain them wi' the saut, saut tear ; 
'Twill make her puir auld heart, I fear, 

In Hinders flee ; 
He was her laureate mony a year, 

That's owre the sea ! 

He saw misfortune's cauld nor'-west 
Lang mustering up a bitter blast ; 
A jillet brak his heart at last, 

111 may she be ! 
So, took a berth afore the mast, 

And owre the sea. 

To tremble under Fortune's cummock, 
On scarce a bellyfu' o' drummock, 
Wi' his proud, independent stomach, 

Could ill agree ; 
So, row't his hurdles in a hammock, 

And owre the sea. 

He ne'er was gien to great misguiding, 
Yet coin his pouches wadna bide in ; 
Wi' him it ne'er was under hiding ; 

He dealt it free : 
The Muse was a' that he took pride in 

That's owre the sea. 

Jamaica bodies, use him weel, 
And hap him in a cozie biel ; 



2i8 TO A HAGGIS. 



Ye'll tind him aye a dainty chiel, 
And fu' o* glee ; 

He vvadua wi'ang the very deil, 

That's owre the sea. 

Fareweel, my rhyme-composing billie ' 
Your native soil was right ill-willie ; 
But may ye flourish like a lily, 

Now bonnilie ! 
ril toast ye in my hindmost gillie 

Tho* owre the sea ! 



TO A HAGGIS. 

FAIR fa* your honest, sonsie face, 
Great chieftain o' the puddin' race ! 
A boon them a' ye tak your place, 

Painch, tripe, or thairm 
Weel are ye worthy o' a grace 

As lang's my arm. 

The groaning trencher there ye fill, 
Your hurdles like a distant hill, 
Your pin wad help to mend a mill, 

In time o' need, 
While through your pores the dews distil 

Like amber bead. 

His knife see rustic Labour dight, 
And cut you up wi' ready slight, 



Trenching your giisliing entrails bright 
Like ony ditch ; 

And then, oh, what a glorious sight, 
Warm-reekin', rich ! 

Then horn for horn they stretch and strive, 
Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive, 
Till a' their weel-swall'd kytes belyve 

Are bent like drums ; 
Then auld guidman, nlaist like to rive, 

" Bethankit " hums. 

Is there that owre his French ragout, 
Or olio that wad staw a sow, 
Or fricassee wad mak her spew 

WV perfect scunner, 
Looks down wi* sneering, scornfu* view 

On sic a dinner ? 

Poor devil ! see him owre his trash. 

As feckless as a wither' d rash, 

His spindle-shank a guid whip-lash, 

His nieve a nit : 
Through bloody flood or field to dash, 

Oh, how unfit ! 

But mark the rustic, haggis-fed, 

The trembling earth resounds his tread, 

Clap in his walie nieve a blade, 

He'll mak it whissle ; 
And legs,»and arms, and heads will sued, 

Like taps o' thrissle. 

Ye powers wha mak mankind your care, 
And dish them out their bill o' fare. 



Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware 
That jaups in luggies ; 
But if ye wish her gratefu' prayer, 



A DEDICATION TO GAYIN HAMILTON, ESQ. 

EXPECT na, sir, in this narration, 
A fleecLin, fleth'rin* Dedication, 
To rouse you up, and ca you guid. 
And sprung o' great and noble bluid, 
Because ye're surnamed like His Grace ; 
Perhaps related to the race ; 
Then when I'm tired — and sae are ye, 
Wi' mony a fulsome, sinfu* lie. 
Set up a face, how I stop short, 
For fear your modesty be hurt. 

This may do— maun do, sir, wi' them wlm 
Maun please the great folks for a wamefu' ; 
For me ! sae laigh I needna bow. 
For, Lord be thankit, I can plough ; 
And when I downa yoke a naig, 
Then, Lord be thankit, I can beg ; 
Sae I shall say, and that*s nae flatterin', 
Its just sic Poet, and sic Patron. 

The Poet, some guid angel help him. 
Or else, I fear some ill ane skelp him ! 
He may do weel for a' he's done yet. 
But only — he's no just begun yet. 



TO GA VI N HA MIL TON. 22 1 



The Patron (sir, ye maun forgie me, 
I winna lie, come what will o' me), 
On every hand it will allow'd be, 
He's just — nae better than he should be. 

I readily and freely grant, 
He downa see a poor man want ; 
AVhat's no his ain he winna tak it, 
AVhat ance he says he winna break it ; 
Ought he can lend he'll no refus't, 
Till aft his guidness is abused ; 
And rascals whyles that do him wrang, 
Even that, he doesna mind it lang : 
As master, landlord, husband, father, 
He doesna fail his part in either. 

But then, nae thanks to him for a* that ; 
Nae godly symptom ye can ca' that ; 
It's naething but a milder feature 
Of our poor sinfu', corrupt nature : 
Ye' 11 get the best o' moral works 
'Mang black Gentoos and pagan Turks, 
Or hunters wild on Ponotaxi, 
Wha never heard of orthodoxy. 
That he's the poor man's friend in need, 
The gentleman in word and deed, 
It's no through terror of damnation ; 
It's just a carnal inclination. 

Morality, thou deadly bane. 
Thy tens o* thousands thou hast slain ! 
Vain is his hope whose stay and trust id 
In moral mercy, truth, and justice I 



222 TO GAVIN HAMILTON, 



No — stretch a point to catch a plack ; 
Abuse a brother to his back ; 
Steal through a winnock frae a whore, 
But point the rake that taks the door ; 
Be to the poor like ony whunstane, 
And hand their noses to the grunstane, 
Ply every art o' legal thieving ; 
No matter, stick to sound believing. 

Learn three-mile prayers, and half-mile graces, 
Wi' weel-spread looves, and lang, wry faces ; 
Grunt up a solemn, lengthen'd groan. 
And damn a' parties but your own : 
ril warrant then, ye're nae deceiver — 
A steady, sturdy, staunch believer. 

ye wha leave the springs o' Calvin, 
For gumlie dubs of your ain delvin' ! 
Ye sons of heresy and error, 
Ye'll some day squeel in quaking terror ! 
When Vengeance draws the sword in wrath, 
And in the lire throws the sheath ; 
When Ruin, with his sweeping besom, 
Just frets till Heaven commission gies him ; 
While o'er the harp pale Misery moans, 
And strikes the ever-deepening tones. 
Still louder shrieks, and heavier groans 1 

Your pardon, sir, for this digression, 
I maist forgat my Dedication ; 
But when divinity comes 'cross me, 
My readers still are sure to lose me. 

So, sir, ye see 'twas nae daft vapour, 
But I maturely thought it proper, 



TO GA VI N HAMILTON. 223 



When a' my works I did review, 

To dedicate them, sir, to you : 

Because (ye needna tak it ill) 

I thought them something like yoursel. 

Then patronise them wi' your favour, 

And your petitioner shall ever 

I had amaist said, ^vev pray ; 

But that's a word I needna say : 

For prayin' I hae little skill o't ; 

Fm baith dead-sweer, and wretched ill o't * 

But I'se repeat each poor man's prayer 

That kens or hears about you, sir — 

** May ne'er Misfortune's growling bark 
Howl through the dwelling o' the Clerk 1 
May ne'er his generous, honest heart, 
For that same generous spirit smart I 
May Kennedy's far-honour'd name 
Lang beat his hymeneal flame. 
Till Hamiltons, at least a dizzen, 
Are frae their nuptial labours risen ! 
Five bonny lasses round their table, 
And seven braw fellows, stout and able, 
To serve their king and country weel 
By word, or pen, or pointed steel ! 
May health and peace, with mutual rays. 
Shine on the evening o' his days ; 
Till his wee curlie John's ier-oe, 
When ebbing life nae mair shall flow, 
The last, sad, mournful rites bestow 1 *' 

I will not wind a lang conclusion 
Wi' complimentary effusion j 



224 TO A LOUSE. 



But whilst your wishes and endeavours 
Are blest wi' Fortune's smiles and favours, 
I am, dear sir, with zeal most fervent, 
Your much indebted, humble servant. 

But if (which Powers above prevent !) 
That iron-hearted carl, Want, 
Attended in liis grim advances 
By sad mistakes and black mischances, 
While hopes, and joys, and pleasures fly him, 
Make you as poor a dog as I am. 
Your humble servant then no more ; 
For who would humbly serve the poor ? 
But by a poor man's hopes in Heaven ! 
While recollection's power is given, 
If, in the vale of humble life. 
The victim sad of Fortune's strife, 
I, through the tender gashing tear, 
Should recognise my master dear, 
If friendless, low, we meet together, 
Then, sir, your hand — my friend and brother ! 



TO A LOUSE, 

Oi!T SEEING 01*E ON A LADY's BONNET AT CHURCH. 

HA ! whare ye gaun, ye crowlin' ferlie ! 
Your impudence protects you sairly '. 
I canna say but ye strunt rarely, 

Owre gauze and lace ; 
Though, faith J I fear ye dine but sparely 
On sic a place. 



Ye ugly, creepin', blastit wonner, 
Detested, shunned, by saunt and sinner, 
How dare ye set your fit upon her, 

Sae fine a lady ! 
Gae somewhere else, and seek your dinner 

On some poor body. 

Swith, in some beggar's hafiet squattle ; 
Th^re ye may creep, and sprawl, and sprattle 
Wi' ither kindred, jumping cattle, 

In shoals and nations ; 
Whare horn nor bane ne'er daur unsettle 

Your thick plantations. 

Now baud you there, ye're out o' sight, 
Below the fatt'rils, snug and tight ; 
Na, faith ye yet ! ye' 11 no be right 

Till ye've got on it, 
The very tapmost, towering height 

0' Miss's bonnet, I 



My sooth ! right bauld y^e set your nose out, 
As plump and grey as ony grozet : 
Oh for some rank, mercurial rozet. 

Or fell, red smeddum, 
I'd giie you sic a hearty doze o't, 

Wad dress your droddum I 

I wadna been surprised to spy 
You on an auld wife's fiaiinen toy : 
Or aiblins some bit duddie boy, 

On's wyliecoat ; 
But Miss's fine Lunardi ! fie ! 

How daur ye do't ? 

p.p 



, 



226 LINES, 



Jenny, dinna toss your head, 
And set your beauties a' abread ! 
Ye little ken what cursM sp>eed 

The blastie's makin' ! 
Thae winks and finger-ends, I dread, 

Are notice takiu' ! 

Oh wad some Power the giftie gie us 

To see oursels as others see us, 

It wad frae mony a blunder free us, 

And foolish notion : 
What airs in dress and gait wad lea'e us, 

And even devotion ! 



LINES 

WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL OYER THE CHIMNEYPIECE IN 
THE PARLOUR OF THE INN AT KEN MORE, TAY^IOUTH. 

ADMIRING Nature in her wildest grace, 
These northern scenes with weary feet I trace ; 
O'er many a winding dale and painful steep, 
The abodes of covey'd grouse and timid sheep, 
My savage journey, curious, I pursue, 
Till famed Breadalbane opens to my view — 
The meeting clitls each deep-sunk glen divides, 
The woods, wild soatter'd, clothe their ample sides, 
Th' outstretching lake, enibosom'd 'mong the bills, 
The eye with wonder and amazement fills : 
The Tay, meandering sweet in infant pride, 
The palace, rising on its venlant side ; 
The lawns, wood-fringed in Nature's native taste ; 
The hillocks, dropt in Nature's careless haste ; 



ADDRESS TO EDINBURGH. 227 



The arches, striding o'er the new-born stream ; 
The village, glittering in the noontide beam- 
Poetic ardours in my bosom swell, 
Lone wandering by the hermit's mossy cell : 
The sweeping theatre of hanging woods ! 
The incessant roar of headlong tumbling floods. 
Here Poesy might wake her Heaven-taught lyre, 
And look through Nature with creative lire ; 
Here, to the wrongs of Fate half-reconciled, 
Misfortune's lighten'd steps might wander wild ; 
And Disappointment, in these lonely bounds. 
Find balm to soothe her bitter, rankling wounds ; 
Here heart-struck Grief might heavenward stretch her 

scan, 
And injured Worth forget and pardon man. 



E" 



ADDRESS TO EDINBURGH. 

DINA ! Scotia's darling seat ! 
All hail thy palaces and towers, 
Where once beneath a monarch's feet 
Sat Legislation's sovereign powers ! 
From marking wildly-scattered flowers, 

As on the banks of Ayr I stray'd. 
And singing, lone, the lingering hours, 
I shelter in thy honour'd shade. 

Here Wealth still swells the golden title, 
As busy Trade his labour plies ; 

There Architecture's noble pride 
Bids elegance and splendour rise ; 



228 ADDRESS TO EDINBURGH, 



I Here Justice, from her native skies, 

I High wields her balance and her rod ; 

There Learning, with his eagle eyes, 
\ Seeks Science in her coy abode. 

\ Thy sons, Edina ! social, kind, 

I With open arms the stranger hail ; 

] Their views enlarged, their liberal mind, 

I Above the narrow, rural vale ; 

I Attentive still to Sorrow's wail, 

\ Or modest Merit's silent claim ; 

I And never may their sources fail ! 

I And never envy blot their name ! 

I Thy daughters bright thy walks adorn, 

\ Gay as the gilded summer sky, 

\ Sweet as the dewy milk-white thorn, 

f Dear as the raptured thrill of joy ! 

\ Fair Burnet strikes th' adoring eye, 

J Heaven's beauties on my fancy shine ; 

I see the Sire of Love on high, 
And own His work indeed divine. 

: There, watching high the least alarms, 

:i Thy rough, rude fortress gleams afar ; 

I Like some bold veteran, grey in arms, 

\ And mark'd with many a seamy scar : 

The ponderous wall and massy bar, 
: Grim-rising o'er the rugged rock, 

Have oft withstood assailing war. 
And oft repell'd th' invader's shock. 

With awe-struck thought, and pitying tears, 
I view that noble, stately dome, 

Where Scotia's kings of other years, 
Famed heroes ! had their royal home : 



EPISTLE TO JOHN LAPRAIK. 229 



Alas, how changed the times to come ! 

Their royal name low in the dust ! 
Their hapless race wild-wandering roam ! 

Though rigid law cries out, 'Twas just. 

"Wild heats my heart to trace your steps, 

Whose ancestors, in days of yore, 
Through hostile ranks and ruin'd gaps 

Old Scotia's bloody lion bore : 
Even I who sing in rustic lore, 

Haply, my sires have left their shed, 
And faced grim Danger's loudest roar, 

Bold-following where your fathers led ! 

Edina ! Scotia's darling seat ! 

All hail thy palaces and towers, 
"Where once beneath a monarch's feet 

Sat Legislation's sovereign powers ! 
From marking wildly-scattered flowers, 

As on the banks of Ayr I stray'd, 
And singing, lone, the lingering hours, 

I shelter in thy honour'd shade. 



EPISTLE TO JOHN LAPRAIK, 

A^ OLD SCOTTISH BARD. 

WHILE briers and woodbines budding green, 
And pai tricks scraichin' loud at e'en, 
And morning poussie whiddin seen, 
Inspire my Muse. 
This freedom in an unknown frien' 
I pray excuse. 



230 EPISTLE TO JOHN LAPRAIK. 



On Fasten-e'en we had a rockin', 

To ca* the crack and weave our stockin' ; 

And there was muckle fun and jokin', 

Ye needna doubt ; 
At length we had a hearty yokin' 

At sang about. 

There was ae sang, arnang the rest, 
Aboon them a* it pleased me best, 
That some kind husband had add rest 

To some sweet wife : 
It thirl'd the heart-strings through the breast, 

A' to the life. 

Tve scarce heard ought described sae weel, 
What generous, manly bosoms feel : 
Thought I, ** Can this be Pope, or Steele, 

Or Beattie's wai k % " 
They tauld me 'twas an odd kind chiel 

About Muirkirk. 

It pat me fidgin-fain to hear't, 
And sae about him there I speirt ; 
Then a* that kent him round declared 

He had ingine ; 
That nane excell'd it, few cam near't, 

It was sae hne ; 

That, set him to a pint of ale, 

And either douce or merry tale, 

Or rhymes and sangs he'd made himsel, 

Or witty catches : 
'Tween Inverness and Teviotdale 

He had few matches. 



EPISTLE TO JOHN LAPRAIK. 231 



Then up I gat, and swore an aith, 

Though I should pawn my pleugh and graith, 

Or died a cadger pownie's death, 

At some dyke-back, 
A pint and gill I'd gie them baith 

To hear your crack. 

But, first and foremost, I should tell, 
Aiuaist as soon as I could spell, 
I to the crambo-jingle fell, 

Though rude and rough : 
Yet crooning to a body's sel 

Does weel enough. 

I am nae Poet, in a sense. 

But just a Rhymer like, by chance, 

And hae to learning nae pretence. 

Yet, what the matter ? 
Whene'er my Muse does on me glance, 

I jingle at her. 

Your critic-folk may cock their nose. 
And say, ** How can you e'er propose, 
You, wha ken hardly verse frae prose, 

To mak a sang ? " 
But, by your leaves, my learned foes, 

Ye're maybe wrang. 

What's a' your jargon o' your schools. 
Your Latin names for horns and stools ; 
If honest nature made you fools. 

What sairs your grammars ? 
Ye'd better ta'en up spades and shools. 

Or knappin'-hammers. 



232 EPISTLE TO JOHN LAPRAIK. 



A set o' dull, conceited hashes, 
Confuse their brains in college classes ! 
They gang in stirks, and come out asses, 

Plain truth to speak ; 
And syne they think to climb Parnassus 

By dint o' Greek I 

Gie me a spark o' Nature's fire ! 
That's a' the learning I desire ; 
Then, though I drudge through dub and mire 

At pleugh or cart, 
My Muse, though hamely in attire. 

May touch the heart. 

Oh, for a spunk o' Allan's glee. 
Or Fergussou's, the bauld and slee, 
Or bright Lapraik's, my friend to be, 
If I can hit it ! 

? That would be lear enough for me, 

I If I could get it ! 

I Now, sir, if ye hae friends enow, 

f Though real friends, I b'lieve, are few, 

i Yet, if your catalogue be fu*, 

I I'se no insist, 

I But gif ye want ae friend that's true, 

I I'm on your list, 

i I 

I winna blaw about mysel ; j 

I As ill I like my fauts to tell ; \ 

\ But friends and folk that wish me well, j 

I They sometimes roose me ; j 

i Though I maun own, as mony still * 

f As far abuse me. \ 

\ 



There's ae wee faut they whiles lay to me, 

I like the lasses — Gude forgie me ! 

For mony a plack they wheedle frae me, 

At daDce or fair ; 
Maybe some ither thiog they gie me, 

They weei can spare. 

But Mauchline race, or Mauchliiie fair, 
I should be proud to meet you there ; 
We'se gie ae night's discharge to Care, 

If we forgather, 
And hae a swap o' rhymin' ware 

Wi' ane anither. 

The four-gill chap, we'se gar him clatter, 
And kirsen him wi' reekin' water ; 
Sj^ne we'll sit down and tak our whitter. 

To cheer our heart ; 
And faith, we'se be acquainted better 

Before we part. 

There's naething like the honest nappy 1 
Whar'U ye e'er see men sae happy, 
Or women sonsie, saft, and sappy 

'Tween morn and morn, 
As them wba like to taste the drappy 

In glass or horn 1 

I've seen me dais*t upon a time, 

I scarce could wink, or see a styme ; 

Just ae half-mutchkin does me prime, 

Aught less is little, 
Then back I rattle on the rhyme, 

As gleg's a whittle ! 



234 SECOND EPISTLE TO LAPRAIK. 



Awa' ye selfish, warly race, 

Wha think that havins, sense, and grace, 

E'en love and friendship, should give place 

To catch-the-piack ! 
I dinna iiko to see your face, 

Nor hear your crack. 

But ye whom social pleasure charms, 
Whose hearts the tide of kindness warms. 
Who hold your beiiisr on the terms, 

" Each aid the others," 
Come to my bowl, come to my arms, 

My friends, my brothers. 

But, to conclude my lang epistle, 
As my auld pen's worn to the grissle ; 
Twa lines frae you would gar me fissle, 

Who am, most fervent, 
While I can either sing or whissle. 

Your friend and servant. 



SECOND EPISTLE TO LAPRAIK 

WHILE new-ca'd kye rowte at the stake, 
And pownies reek in pleugh or braik, 
This hour on e'enin's edge I take, 

To own I'm debtor 
To honest-hearted, auld Lapraik, 

For his kind letter. 

Forjesket sair, wi' weary legs, 
Rattlin* the corn out-owre the rigs, 



Or dealing through amang the naig& 

Their ten-hours' bite, 

My awkward Muse sair pleads and begs 
I wouldna write. 

The tapetless, ramfeezled hizzie, 
She's saft at best, and something lazy, 
Quo' she, *' Ye ken, we've been sae busy, 

This month and mair, 
That, trouth, my head is grown right dizzy 

And something sair." 

Her dowff excuses pat me mad : 

" Conscience," says I, *' ye thowless jad 1 

I'll write, and that a liearty blaud, 

This vera night ; 
So dinna ye afiront your trade, 

But rhyme it right. 

"Shall bauld Lapraik, the king o' hearts, 
Though mankind were a pack o' cartes, 
Roose you sae weel for your deserts. 

In terms sae friendly, 
Yet ye'U neglect to shaw your parts, 

And thank him kindly ? " 

Sae I gat paper in a blink. 

And down gaed stumpie in the ink : 

Quoth I, ** Before 1 sleep a wink, 

I vow ril close it ; 
And if ye winna mak it clink. 

By Jove, I'll prose it 1 '* 

Sae I've begun to scrawl, but whether 
In rhyme, or prose, or baith thegither, 



236 SECOND EPISTLE TO LAPRAIK, 



Or some hotch-potch that's rightly neither, 
Let time mak proof ; 

But I shall scribble down some blether 
Just clean alT-loof. 

My worthy friend, ne'er grudge and carp, 
Though Fortune use you hard and sharp ; 
Come, kittle up your moorland-harp 

Wi' gleesome touch ! 
Ne'er mind how Fortune waft and warp ; 

She's but a bitch. 

She's gien me mony a jirt and fleg. 

Sin' I could striddle ovvre a rig ; 

But, by the Lord, though I should beg 

Wi' lyart pow, 
I'll laugh, and sing, and shake my leg, 

As lang's 1 dow ! 

Now comes the sax-and-twentieth simmer 
I've seen the bud upo' the timmer, 
Still persecuted by the limmer 

Frae year to year ; 
But yet, despite the kittle kimmer, 

I, Rob, am here. 

Do ye envy the city gent, 

Behind a kist to lie and sklent, 

Or purse-proud, big wi' cent, per cent., 

And muckle wame, 
In some bit brugh to represent 

A bailie's name % 

Or is't the paughty, feudal thane, 
Wi* ruffled sark and glancing cane, 



SECOND EPISTLE TO LAP R A IK. 237 



Wha thinks himsel nae sheep-sbank bane, 

But lordly stalks, * 

While caps and bonnets all' are ta'en, j 

As by he walks ? ^ 

Thou wha gies us each guid gift ! ; 

Gie me 0' wit and sense a lift, \ 

Then turn me, if Thou please, adrift, \ 

Through Scotland wide ; 
Wi* cits nor lairds I wadna shift, 

In a' their pride ! 

Were this the charter of our state, 
*' On pain o* hell be rich and great," 
Damnation then would be our fate 

Beyond remead ; 
But, thanks to Heaven ! that's no the gate 

We learn our creed. 

For thus the royal mandate ran, 

When first the human race began — ! 

' ' The social, friendly, honest man, 

Wliate'er he be, 
'Tis he fulfils great Nature's plan, 

And none but he 1 " 

mandate glorious and divine ! : 

The ragged followers o' the Nine, \ 

Poor, thoughtless devils ! yet may shii^e \ 

In glorious light, i 

While sordid sons o' Mammon's line \ 

Are dark as night. ? 

\ 

Tho' here they scrape, and squeeze, and growl, ' 

Their worthless nievefu' 0' a soul \ 



238 ON TWO LA WYERS, 



May in some future carcase howl, 

The forest's fright ; 

Or in some day-detesting owl 

May shun the light. 

Then may Lapraik and Burns arise, 
To reach their native, kindred skies, 
And sing their pleasures, hopes, and joys, 

In some mild sphere, 
Still closer knit in friendship's ties 

Each passing year 1 



EXTEMPORE ON TWO LAWYERS. 

LORD ADVOCATE. 

HE clench'd his pamphlets in his fist, 
He quoted and he hinted, 
Till in a declamation mist 

His argument he tint o*t ; 
He gaped for't, he graped for't, 
He found it was awa*, man ; 
But what his common sense cam short 
He ek^d out wi' law, man. 

DEAN OF FACULTY. 

Collected, Harry stood a wee, 

Then open'd out his arm, man ; 
His lordship sat, wi' ruefu e'e. 

And eyed the gath'ring storm, man : 
Like wind-driven hail, it did assail, 

Or torrents owre a linn, man ; 
The Bench, sae wise, lift up their eyes, 

Haif-waken'd wi' the din, man. 



TO WILLIAM SIMPSON. 239 



VERSE 

TO THE MASTER OF THE HOUSE WHERE BURNS HAD 
BEEN ENTERTAINED. 

WHEN death's dark stream I ferry o'er, 
A time that surely shall come ; 
In Heaven itself I'll ask no more, 
Than just a Highland welcome. 



EPISTLE TO WILLIAM SIMPSON, 

OCHILTREE. 

I GAT your letter, winsome Willie ; 
Wi* gratefu' heart I thank you brawlie, 
Tho' I maun say't, I wad be silly, 

And unco vain, 
Should I believe, my coaxin* billie, 
Your flatt'rin* strain. 

But I'se believe ye kindly meant it, 
I sud be laith to think ye liinted 
Ironic satire, sidelins sklented 

On my poor Musie ; 
Though in sic ph raisin* terms ye penn'd it, 

I scarce excuse ye. 

My senses wad be in a creel, 
Should I but dare a hope to speel, 
Wi' AUau, or wi' Gilbertfier, 

The braes o' fame ; 
Or Fergusson, the writer chiel, 

A deathless name. 



240 TO WILLIAM SIMPSON. 



(0 Fergusson ! thy glorious parts 

111 suited law's dry musty arts ! 

My curse upon your whunstane hearts, 

Ye E'nbrugh gentry ! 
The tithe o' what ye waste at cartes 

Wad stow'd his pantry !) 

Yet when a tale comes i' my head, 

Or lasses gie my heart a screed, 

As whiles they're like to be my deed, 

(0 sad disease ! ) 
I kittle up my rustic reed ; 

It gies me ease. 

Auld Coila now may fidge fu' fain, 

She's gotten poets o' her ain, 

Chiels wha their chanters winna hain, 

But tune their lays, 
Till echoes a' resound again 

Her weel-sung praise. 

Nae poet thought her worth his while, 
To set her name in measured style ; 
She lay like some unkenn'd-of isle 

Beside New Holland, 
Or where wild-meeting oceans boil 

Besouth Magellan. 

Ramsay and famous Fergusson 
Gied Forth and Tay a lift aboon ; 
Yarrow and Tweed, to mony a tune, 

Owre Scotland rin<;s, 
While Irwin, Lugar, Ayr, and Doon, 

Naebody sings. 



TO WILLIAM SIMPSON. 241 



Th' missus, Tiber, Thames, and Seine, 
Glide sweet in mony a tunefu' line ! 
But, Willie, set your fit to mine, 

And cock your crest, 
We'll gar our streams and burnies shine 

Up wi' the best. 



We'll sing auld Coila's plains and fells, \ 

Her moors red-brown wi' heather-bells, f 

Her banks and braes, her dens and dells, \ 

Where glorious Wallace 

Aft bare the gree, as story tells, i 

Frae southron billies. \ 

At Wallace' name, what Scottish blood | 

But boils up in a spring-tide flood ! I 

Oft have our fearless fathers strode I 

By Wallace' side, \ 

Still pressing onward, red-wat shod, | 

Or fflorious died. \ 

I 

Oh, sweet are Coila's haughs and woods, | 

When lintwhites chant amang the buds, { 

And jinkin' hares, in amorous whids. 

Their loves enjoy, i 

While through the braes the cushat croods | 

Wi' wailfii' cry ! ? 

{ 

Even winter bleak has charms to me, f 

When winds rave through the naked tree ; I 

Or frosts on hills of Ochiltree } 

Are hoary grey : | 

Or blinding drifts wild-furious flee, ■ | 

Dark'ning the day ! | 



242 TO WILLIAM SIMPSON, 



O Nature ! a' thy shows and forms, 
To feeling, pensive hearts hae charms I 
Whether the summer kindly warms 

Wi' life and light, 
Or winter howls, in gusty storms, 

The lang, dark night ! 

The Muse, nae poet ever fand her, 
Till by himsel he learn'd to wander, 
Adown some trotting burn's meander, 

And no think lang ; 
Oh sweet, to stray and pensive ponder 

A heart-felt sang ! 

The war'ly race may drudge and drive, 
Hog-shouther, jundie, stretch, and strive — 
Let me fair Nature's face descrive. 

And I, wi' pleasure, 
Shall let the busy, grumbling hive 

Bum owre their treasure. 

Fareweel, ** my rhyme-composing brither ! " 
We've been owre lang unkenn'd to ither : 
Now let us lay our heads thegither, 
In love fraternal : 
May Enyy wallop in a tether, 

Black fiend, infernal ! 

While Highlandmen hate tolls and taxes ; 
While moorlan' herds like guid, fat braxies, 
While terra firma on her axis 

Diurual turns, 
Count on a friend, in faith and practice, 

In Robert Burns. 



TO WILLIAM SIMPSON. 243 



POSTSCRIPT. 

My memory's no worth a preen : 

I had amaist forgotten clean 

Ye bade me write you what they mean 

By this New Light, 
'Bout which our herds sae aft hae been 

Maist like to fight. 

In days when mankind were but callans 

At grammar, logic, and sic talents, 

They took nae pains their speech to balance, 

Or rules to gie, 
But spak their thoughts in plain, braid Lallans, 

Like you or me. 

In thae auld times, they thought the moon 
Just like a sark, or pair of shoon, 
Wore by degrees, till her last roon 

Gaed past their viewing, 
And shortly after she was done, 

They gat a new one. 

This pass'd for certain — undisputed : 
It ne'er cam i* their heads to doubt it, 
Till chiels gat up and wad confute it, 

And ca'd it wrang ; 
And muckle din there was about it, 

Baith loud and lang. 

Some herds, weel learn'd upo' the beuk, 
Wad threap auld folk the thing mist( uk ; 
For 'twas the auld moon turn'd a neuk, 

And out o' sight, 
And backlins-comin', to the leuk 

She grew mair bright. 



This was denied — it was affirm'd ; 

The herds and liirsels were alarm'd ; 

The reverend grey-beards raved and storm'd, 

That beardless laddies 
Should think they better were inform'd 

Than their auld daddies. 

Frae less to mair it gaed to sticks ; 

Frae words and aiths to clours and nicks ; 

And mony a fallow gat his licks, 

Wi' hearty crunt : 
And some, to learn theni for their tricks, 

Were hang'd and brunt. 

This game was play'd in mony lands, 
And Auld-Light caddies bure sic hands 
That, faith, the youngsters took the sands 

Wi' nimble shanks, 
Till lairds forbade, by strict commands, 

Sic bluidy pranks. 

But ITew-Light herds gat sic a cowe, 
Folk thought them ruin'd stick and stowe, 
Till now amaist on every knowe 

Ye'll find ane placed ; 
And some their New-Light fair avow. 

Just quite barefaced. 

IS^ae doubt the Anld-Light flocks are bleatin' 
Their zealous herds are vex'd and sweatin' ; 
Mysel, I've even seen them greetin' 

Wi' girnin' spite, 
To hear the moon sae sadly lied on, 

By word and write. 



TO JOHN RANKINE. 245 



But shortly they will cowe the loons ! 
Some Auld-Light herds in neibor towns 
Are mind't, in things they ca* balloons, 

To tak a flight, 
And stay ae month amang the moons, 

And see them right. 

Uuid observation they will gie them ; 

And when the auld moon's gaun to lea'e theiri, 

The hindmost shaird, they'll fetch it wi' them, 

Just i' their pouch. 
And when the New-Light billies see them, 

I think they'll crouch ! 

Sae, ye observe that a* this clatter 

Is naethiug but a *' moonshine matter ; " 

But though dull prose-folk Latin splatter 

In logic tulzie, 
I hope we bardies ken some better 

Than mind sic brulzie. 



EPISTLE TO JOHN RANKINE, 

ENCLOSING SOME POEMS. 

O ROUGH, rude, ready-witted Rankine, 
The wale o' cocks for fun and drinkiu' 
There's mony godly folks are thinkin' 

Your dreams and tricks 
Will send you, Korah-like, a sin kin*, 

Straught to auld Nick's. 

Ye hae sae mony cracks and cants, 
And in your wicked, drucken rants, 



246 TO JOHN RANKINE. 



Ye mak a devil o' the saunts, 

And fill them fou ; 

And then their failings, flaws, and want.s, 
Are a' seen through. 

Hypocrisy, in mercy spare it ! 
That holy rohe, oh, dinna tear it ! 
8pare't for their sakes wha often wear it, 

The lads in black ! 
But your curst wit, when it comes near it, 

Rives' t atF their back. 

Think, wicked sinner, wha ye' re skaithing, 
It's just the blue-gown badge and claithing 
0' saunts ; tak that, ye lea'e them naething 

To ken them by, 
Frae ony unregenerate heathen 

Like you or I. 

I've sent you here some rhyming ware, 
A' that I bargain' d for, and mair ; 
Sae, w^hen ye hae an hour to spare, 

I will expect 
Yon sang, ye*ll sen't wi' cannie care, 

And no neglect. 

Though, faith, sma* heart hae I to sing I 
My Muse dow scarcely sprea<l her wing ! 
I've play'd mysel a bonny spring. 

And danced my fill ! 
I'd better gaen and sair't the king. 

At Bunker's Hill. 

'Twas ae night lately, in my fun, 
I gaed a roving wi' the gun, 



TO JOHN RANKINE. 247 



And brought a paitrick to the grnn', 
A bonny hen ; 

And, as the twilight was begun, 

Thought nane wad ken. 

The poor wee thing was little hurt ; 

I straikit it a wee for sport, 

Ne'er thinking they wad fash me for't ; 

But, diel-ma-care ! 
Somebody tells the poacher court 

The hale affair. 

Some auld-used hands had ta'en a note 
That sic a hen had got a shot, 
I was suspected for the plot ; 

I scorn'd to lie ; 
So gat the whistle o' my groat. 

And pay't the fee. 

But, "by my gun, o' guns the wale, 
And by my pouther and my hail, 
And by my hen, and by her tail, 

I vow and swear ! 
The game shall pay, o'er moor and dale, 

For this, neist year. 

As soon's the clockin'-time is by, 
And the wee pouts begun to cry, 
Lord, I'se hae sportin' by and by, 

For my gowd guinea : 
Though I should herd the buckskin kye 

For't, in Virginia. 

Trouth, they had muckle for to blame ! 
'Twas neither broken wing nor limb, 



248 ON CAPTAIN HENDERSON 



But twa- three drops about the wame 

Scarce through the feathers ! 

And baith a yellow George to claim 

And thole their blethers ! 

It pits me aye as mad's a hare ; 

So I can rhyme nor write nae mair ; 

But pennyworths again is fair, 

When time's expedient : 
Meanwhile I am, respected sir, 

Your most obedient. 



KLEGV ON CAPTAIN MATTHEW HENDERSON, 

A GENTLEMAN WHO HELD THE PATENT FOK HIS HONOURS 
IMMEDIATELY FROM ALMIGHTY GOD. 

O DEATH ! thou tyrant fell and bloody ! 
The meikle devil wi' a woodie 
Hanrl thee hame to his black smiddie, 
O'er hurcheon hides. 
And like stock-fish come o'er his studdie 
Wi' thy auld sides ! 

He's gane ! he's gane ! he's frae us torn 1 

The ae best fellow e'er was born ! 

Thee, Matthew, Nature's sel shall mourn 

By wood and wild, 
Where, haply. Pity strays forlorn, 

Frae man exiled ! 

Ye hills ! near neibors o' the starns, 
That proudly cock your cresting cairns ! 



ON CAPTAIN HENDERSON, 249 



Ye cliffs, the haunts of sailing yearns, 

Where Echo slumbers ! 

Come join, ye Nature's sturdiest bairns, 
My wailing numbers ! 

Mourn, ilka grove the cushat kens ! 
Ye haz'lly shaws and briery dens ! 
Ye bnrnies, wimplin* down your glens, 

Wi* toddlin' din, 
Or foaming Strang, wi' hasty stens, 

Frae lin to lin. 

Mourn, little harebells o'er the lea ; 
Ye stately foxgloves, fair to see ; 
Ye woodbines hanging bonnilie 

In scented bowers ; 
Ye roses on your thorny tree, 

The first o' flowers. 

At dawn, when every grassy blade 

Droops with a diamond at its head, 

At even, when beans their fragrance shed, 

r the rustling gale, 
Ye maukins whiddin' through the glade, 

Come join my wail. 

Mourn, ye wee songsters 0' the wood ; 
Ye grouse that crap the heather bud ; 
Ye curlews calling through a clud ; 

Ye whistling plover ; 
And mourn, ye whirring pai trick brood — 

He's gane for ever ! 

Mourn, sooty coots, and speckled teals ; 
Ye fisher herons, watching eels ; 



250 ON CAPTAIN HENDERSON 



Ye duck and drake, wi' airy wheels 
Circling the lake ; 

Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels, 
Rair for his sake. 

Mourn, clam'ring craiks at close o* day, 
'Mang fields o' flowering clover gay ; 
And when ye wing your annual way 

Frae our cauld shore, 
Tell thae far warlds wha lies in clay, 

Wham we deplore. 

Ye houlets, frae your ivy bower, 
In some auld tree, or eldritch tower. 
What time the moon, wi' silent glower, 

Sets up her horn, 
Wail through the dreary midnight hour 

Till waukrife morn ! 

rivers, forests, hills, and plains ! 
Oft have ye heard my canty strains : 
But now, what else for me remains 

But tales of woe ? 
And frae my e'en the drapping rains 

Maun ever flow. 

Mourn, Spring, thou darling of the year ! 
Ilk cowslip cup shall kep a tear ; 
Thou, Simmer, while each corny spear 

Shoots up its head, 
Thy gay, green, flowery tresses shear 

For him that's dead ! 

Thou, Autumn, wi' thy yellow hair, 
In grief thy sallow mantle tear 1 



ON CAPTAIN HENDERSON 251 



Thou, Wiuter, hurling through the air 
The roaring blast, 

Wide o'er the naked world declare 

The worth we've lost 1 

Mourn him, thou Sun, great source of light 
Mourn, empress of the silent night ! 
And you, ye twinkling starnies bright, 

My Matthew mourn ! 
For through your orbs he's taeri his flight, 

Ne'er to return. 

Henderson ! the man — the brother ! 
And art thou gone, and gone for ever ! 
And hast thou cross'd that unknown river, 

Life's dreary bound ? 
Like thee, where shall I find another, 

The world around ! 

Go to your sculptured tombs, ye great. 
In a' the tinsel trash o' state ! 
But by thy honest turf I'll wait, 

Thou man o' worth ! 
And weep the ae best fellow's fate 

E'er lay in earth. 



THE EPITAPH. 

Stop, passenger ! — my story's brief, 
And truth I shall relate, man ; 

I tell nae common tale o' grief — 
For Matthew was a great man. 



252 ON CAPTAIN HENDERSON 



If thou uncommon merit hast, 
Yet spurn'd at Fortune's door, man, 

A look of pity hither cast — 
For Matthew was a poor man. 

If thou a noble sodger art, 

That passest by this grave, man, 

There moulders here a gallant liean - 
For Mattliew was a brave man. 

If thou on men, their works and ways, 
Canst throw uncommon light, man, 

Here lies wha weel had won thy prais'j 
For Matthew was a briglit man. 

If thou at friendship's sacred ca' 
Wad life itself resign, man, 

Tiie sympathetic tear maun fa' — 
For Matthew was a kind man. 

If thou art staunch without a stain, 
Like the unchanging blue, man, 

This was a kinsman o' thy ain — 
For Matthew was a true man. 

If thou hast wit, and fun, and fire, 
And ne'er guid wine did fear, man, 

This was thy billie, dam, and sire - 
For Matthew was a queer man. 

If ony whiggish whingin* sot 

To blame poor Matthew dare, man, 

May dooi and sorrow be his lot ! — 
For Matthew was a rare man. 



LAMENT OF QUEEN MARY, 253 



LAMENT OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS, ON 
THE APPROACH OF SPRING. 

NOW Nature hangs her mantle green 
On every blooming tree, 
And spreads her sheets o' daisies white 

Out o'er the grassy lea : 
Now Phoebus cheers the crystal streams, 

And glads the azure skies ; 
But nought can glad the weary wight 
That fast in durance lies. 

Now lav'rocks wake the merrj^ morn, 

Aloft on dewy wing ; 
The merle, in his noontide bower, 

Makes woodland echoes ring ; 
The mavis wild, wi' mony a note, 

Sings drowsy day to rest ; 
In love and freedom they rejoice, 

Wi' care nor thrall opprest. 

Now blooms the lily by the bank. 

The primrose down the brae ; 
The liawthorn's budding in the gleu, 

And milk-white is the slae : 
The meanest hind in fair Scotland 

May rove their sweets amanij ; 
But I, the queen of a' Scotland, 

Maun lie in prison Strang ! 

I was the queen o' bonny France, 

Where hai)py I hae been ; 
Fu' lightly rase I in the morn, 

As blithe lay down at e'en : 



254 LAMENT OF QUEEN MARY, 



And I'm the sovereign of Scotland, 

And mony a traitor there ; 
Yet here I lie in foreign bands, 

And never-ending care. 

But as for thee, thou false woman ! — 

My sister and my fae, 
Grim Vengeance yet shall whet a sword 

That through thy soul shall gae ! 
The weeping blood in woman's breast 

Was never known to thee ; 
Nor the balm that draps on wounds of woe 

Frae woman's pitying e'e. 

My son ! my son ! may kinder stars 

Upon thy fortune shine ; 
And may those pleasures gild thy reign 

That ne'er wad blink on mine ! 
God keep thee frae thy mother's faes, 

Or turn their hearts to thee : 
And where thou meet'st thy mother's friend, 

Remember him for me ! 

Oh ! soon to me may summer suns 

Nae mair light up the morn ! 
Nae mair to me the autumn winds 

Wave o'er the yellow corn ! 
And in the narrow house o* death 

Let winter round me rave ; 
And the next flowers that deck the spring 

Bloom on my peaceful grave ! 




ODE: 

SACKED TO THE MEMORY OF MRS. OSWAT.D. 

DWELLER in yon dungeon dark, 
Hangman of creation ! mark 
Who in widow-weeds appears, 
Laden with unhonoiir'd years, 
Koosing with care a bursting purse, 
Baited with many a deadly curse ! 

STROPHE. 

View the withered beldam's face — 

Can thy keen inspection trace 

Aught of humanity's sweet melting grace ? 

Note that eye, 'tis rheum o'erflows. 

Pity's flood there never rose. 

See these hands, ne'er stretch'd to save, 

Hands that took — but never gave. 

Keeper of Mammon's iron chest, 

Lo, there she goes, unpitied and unblest — 

She goes, but not to realms of everlasting rest ! 

ANTISTROPHE. 

Plunderer of armies, lift thine eyes 

(A while forbear, ye torturing fiends) ; 

Seest thou whose step, unwilling, hither bends ? 

No fallen angel, hurl'd from upper skies ; 

'Tis thy trusty quondam mate, 

Doom'd to share thy fiery fate, 

She, tardy, hellward plies. 



256 EPISTLE TO R, GRAHAM, ESQ. 



', EPODE. 

I 

And are tliey of no more avail, 
Ten thousand glittering pounds a-year ? 
In other worlds can Mammon fail, 
J Omnipotent as he is here ? 

i Oh, bitter mockery of the pompous bier, 

;: While down the wretched vital part is driven ! 

I The cave-lodged beggar, with a conscience clear, 

\ Expires in rags, unknown, and goes to heaven. 

I 
1 
! 



EPISTLE TO R GRAHAM, ESQ. OF FINTRY. 

WHEN Nature her great masterpiece design'd, 
And framed her last, best work, the humap 
mind, 
Her eye intent upon the mazy plan, 
She form'd of various parts the various man. 

Then first she calls the useful many forth ; 
Plain plodding industry and sober worth : 
Thence peasants, farmers, native sons of earth, 
And merchandise' whole genus take their birth : 
Each prudent cit a warm existence finds, 
And all mechanics' many-apron'd kinds. 
Some other rarer sorts are wanted yet, 
The lead and buoy are needful to the net ; 
The capiit mortuum of gross desires 
Makes a material for mere knights and squires 
The martial phosphorus is taught to flow, 
She kneads the lumpish philosophic dough, 



Then marks th* unyielding mass with grave designs^, 
Law, physic, politics, and deep divines : 
Last she sublimes th' Aurora of the poles, 
The flashing elements of female souls. 

The order'd system fair before her stood, 
Nature, well pleased, pronounced it very good ; 
But ere she gave creating labour o'er, 
Half-jest, she tried one curious labour more. 
Some spumy, fiery, ignis-fatuus matter, 
Such as the slightest breath of air might scatter ; 
With arch alacrity and conscious glee 
(Nature may have her whim as well as we, 
Her Hogarth-art perhaps she meant to show it) 
She forms the thing, and christens it — a Poet, 
Creature, though oft the prey of care and sorrow, 
When blest to-day, unmindful of to-morrow. 
A being form'd t' amuse his graver friends, 
Admired and praised — and there the homage ends : 
A mortal quite unfit for Fortune's strife, 
Yet oft the sport of all the ills of life ; 
Prone to enjoy each pleasure riches give. 
Yet haply wanting wherewithal to live ; 
Longing to wipe each tear, to heal each groan, 
Yet frequent all unheeded in his own. 

But honest Nature is not quite a Turk, 
She laugh'd at first, then felt for her poor work. 
Pitying the propless climber of mankind, 
She cast about a standard tree to find ; 
And, to support his helpless woodbine state, 
Attach'd him to the generous truly great, 
A title, and the only one I claim, 
To lay strong hold for hplp on bounteous Graham. 
R-r 



258 EPISTLE TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ. 



Pity the tuneful Muses' hapless train, 
\Yeak, timid landsmen on life's stormy main ! 
Their hearts no selfish, stern, absorbent stuff, 
That never gives — though humbly takes enough ; 
The little fate allows, they share as soon, 
Unlike sage, proverb' d, wisdom's hard-wrung boon. 
The world were blest did bliss on them depend, 
Ah, that *' the friendly e'er should want a friend ! " 
Let prudence number o'er each sturdy son, 
Who life and wisdom at one race begun. 
Who feel by reason, and who give by rule, 
(Instinct's a brute, and sentiment a fool !) 
Who make poor will do wait upon / should — 
We own they're prudent, but who feels they're good ? 
Ye wise ones, hence ! ye hurt the social eye ! 
God's image rudely etch'd on base alloy ! 

But come, ye who the godlike pleasure know, 
Heaven's attribute distingiiish'd — to bestow ! 
Whose arms of love would grasp the human race : 
Come thou who giv'st with all a courtier's grace ; 
Friend of my life, true patron of my rhymes ! 
Prop of my dearest hopes for future times. 
Why shrinks my soul half-blushing, half afraid, 
Backward, abash'd to ask thy friendly aid ? 

I know my need, I know thy giving hand, 
I crave thy friendship at thy kind command ; 
But there are such who court the tuneful Nine — 
Heavens ! should the branded character be minn ! 
Whose verse in manhood's pride sublimely flows, 
Yet vilest reptiles in their begging prose. 
Mark, how their lofty independent spirit 
Soars on the spurning wing of injured merit ! 



Seek not the proofs in private life to find ; 

Pity the best of words should be but wind ! ■ 

So, to heaven's gates the lark's shrill song ascends, : 

But grovelling on the earth the carol ends. * 

In all the clam'rous cry of starving want, • 

They dun benevolence with shameless front ; j 

Oblige them, patronise their tinsel lays, i 

They persecute you all your future days ! ! 

Ere my poor soul such deep damnation stain, 

My horny fist assume the plough again ; | 

The piebald jacket let me patch once more ; f 

On eighteenpence a week I've lived before. 

Though, thanks to Heaven, I dare even that last shift ! 

I trust, meantime, my boon is in thy gift : 

That, placed by thee upon the wish'd-for height, 

Where, man and nature fairer in her sight, 

My Muse may imp her wing for some sublimer lliglit. 



TO ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ. OF FINTRY. 

LATE crippled of an arm, and now a leg, 
About to beg a pass for leave to beg ; 
Dull, listless, teased, dejected, and deprest 
(Nature is adverse to a cripple's rest) ; 
Will generous Graham list to his poet's wail ? 
(It soothes poor Misery, heark'ning to her tale,) 
And hear him curse the light he first survey'd, 
And doubly curse the luckless rhyming trade ? 
Thou, Nature ! partial Nature ! I arraign ; 
Of thy caprice maternal I complain. 



26o TO R, GRAHAM, ESQ, 



The lion and the bull thy care have found, 

One shakes the forests, and one spurns the ground : 

Thou giv'st the ass his hide, the snail his shell, 

Th* envenom'd wasp, victorious, guards his cell ; 

Thy minions, kings, defend, control, devour. 

In all th' omnipotence of rale and power. 

Foxes and statesmen subtle wiles insure ; 

The cit and polecat stink, and are secure ; 

Toads with their poison, doctors with their drug, 

The priest and hedgehog in their robes are snug ; 

Even silly woman has her warlike arts, 

Her tongue and eyes — her dreaded spear and darts. 

But, oh ! thou bitter stepmother and hard, 
To thy poor, fenceless, naked child — the bard 1 
A thing unteachable in worldly skill, 
And half an idiot, too, more helpless still 
No heels to bear him from the o])ening dnn ■ 
No claws to dig, his hated sight to shun ; 
No horns, but those by luckless Hymen worn, 
And those, alas ! not Amalthea's horn : 
No nerves olfactory, Mammon's trusty cur. 
Clad in rich Dulness' comfortable fur — 
In naked feeling, and in aching pride, 
He bears the unbroken blast from every si<!o : 
Vampire booksellers drain him to the heart, 
And scorpion critics cureless venom dart. 

Critics ! — appall'd I venture on the name. 
Those cut-throat bandits in the paths of fame : 
Bloody dissectors, worse than ten Monroes : — 
He hacks to teach, they mangle to expose. 

His heart by causeless wanton malice wrung, 
By blockheads' daring into madness stung \ 



TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ. 261 



His well- won bays, than life itself nioi-e dear, 

By miscreants torn, who ne'er one sprig must wear : 

Foil'd, bleeding, tortured, in the unequal strife. 

The hapless poet flounders on through lite ; 

Till, fled each hope that once his bosom fired, 

And fled each Muse that glorious once inspired, 

Low sunk in squalid unprotected age. 

Dead, even resentment for his injured page. 

He heeds or feels no more the ruthless critic's rage. 

So, by some hedge, the generous steed deceased, 

For half-starved snarling curs a dainty feast. 

By toil and famine worn to skin and bone, 

Lies senseless of each tugging bitch's son. 

Dulness ! portion of the truly blest f 
Calm shelter'd haven of eternal rest I 
Thy sons ne'er madden in the fierce extremes 
Of Fortune's polar frost, or torrid beams. 
If mantling high she fills the golden cup, 
With sober selfish ease they sip it up ; 
Conscious the bounteous meed they well deserve, 
They only wonder **some folks " do not starve. 
The grave sage hern thus easy picks his frog, 
And thinks the mallard a sad w^orthless do^. 
When Dissappointment snaps the clue of Hope, 
And through disastrous night they darkling grope, 
With deaf endurance sluggishly they bear. 
And just conclude that ** fools are Fortune's care." 
So, heavy, passive to the tempest's shocks, 
Strong on the sign-post stands the stupid ox. 

Not so the idle Muses' mad-cap train. 
Not such the workings of their moon-stru('l< braiji I 
In equanimity they never dwell, 
By turns in soaring heaven or vaulted Lol). 



262 LAMENT, 



I dread thee, Fate, relentless and severe, 
With all a poet's, husband's, father's fear ! 
Already one stronghold of hope is lost — 
Glencairn, the truly noble, lies in dust ; 
(Fled, like the sun eclipsed as noon appears. 
And left us darkling in a world of tears :) 
Oh ! hear my ardent, grateful, selfish prayer — 
Fin try, my other stay, long bless and spare ! 
Through a long life his hopes and wishes crown, 
And bright in cloudless skies his sun go down ! 
May bliss domestic smooth his private path, 
Give energy to life, and soothe his latest breath. 
With many a filial tear circling the bed of death ! 



LAMENT FOR JAMES, EARL OF GLENCAIRN. 

THE wind blew hollow frae the hills, 
By fits the sun's departing beam 
Look'd on the fading yellow woods 

That waved o'er Lugar's winding stream : 
Beneath a craigy steep, a bard, 

Laden with years and meikle pain, 
In loud lament bewail'd his lord, 
Whom death had all untimely ta'en. 

He lean'd him to an ancient aik. 

Whose trunk was mouldering down with years ; 
His locks were bleachM white wi' time, 

His hoary cheek was wet wi' tears ; 
And as he touched his trembling harp, 

And as he tuned his doleful sang. 
The winds, lamenting through their caves, 

To Echo boie the notes alang : — 



LAMENT, 263 



*' Ye scatter'd birds that faintly sing 

The reliques of the vernal quire ! 
Ye woods that shed on a* the winds 

The honours of the aged year ! 
A few short months, and glad and gay, 

Again ye'll charm the ear and e'e ; 
But nocht in all revolving time 

Can gladness bring again to me. 

*' I am a bending, aged tree, 

That long has stood the wind and rain ; 
But now has come a cruel blast, 

And my last hold of earth is gane : 
Nae leaf o* mine shall greet the spring, 

Nae simmer sun exalt mj^ bloom ; 
But I maun lie before the storm. 

And ithers plant them in my room. 

** I've seen sae mony change tV years. 

On earth I am a stranger grown ; 
I wander in the ways of men, 

Alike unknowing and unknown ; 
Unheard, unpitied, unrelieved, 

I bare alane my lade 0' care. 
For silent, low, on beds of dust, 

Lie a' that would my sorrows share. 

"And last (the sum of a* my griefs !) 

My noble master lies in clay ; 
The flower amang our barons bold, 

J J is country's pride — his country's stay ! 
In weary being now I pine, 

For a' the life of life is dead, 
And hope has left my aged ken, 

On forward wing for ever fled. 



I * ^ Awake thy last sad voice, my harp 1 

I The voice of woe and wild despair ! 

i Awake ! resound thy latest lay — 

^ Then sleep in silence evermair ! 

J And thou, my last, best, onlj?- friend, 

I That fillest an untimely tomb, 

5 Accept this tribute from the bard 

I Thou brought from Fortune's mirkest gloom. 

'* In Poverty's low barren vale 

Thick mists, obscure, involved me round ; 
Though oft I turn'd the wistful eye, 

Nae ray of fame was to be found ; 
Thou found'st me, like the morning sun, 

That melts the fogs in limpid air — 
The friendless bard, and rustic song, 

Became alike thy fostering care. 

** Oh ! why has worth so short a date ? 

While villains ripen grey with time 
Must thou, the noble, generous, great, 

Fall in bold manhood's early prime ? 
Why did I live to see that day — 

A day to me so full of woe ? ^ 

Oh ! had I met the mortal shaft 

Which laid my benefactor low ! 

" The bridegroom may forget the bride 

Yf as made his w^edded wife yestreen ; 
The monarch may forget the crown 

That on his head an hour has been ; 
Tlie mother may forget the child 

That smiles sae sweetly on her knee 
But I'll remember thee, Glencnirn, 

And a' that thou hast done for my ! " 



LINES i 

SENT TO SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD, BART., OF WIITTEFOORD, | 

WITH THE FOREGOING POEM. I 

\ 

THOU, who tb}^ honour as thy God rever'st, : 

Who, save thy mind's reproach, nought ; 

earthly fear'st, j 

To thee this votive offering I impart, ; 

The tearful tribute of a broken heart. I 

The friend thou valued'st, I the patron loved ; ', 
His worth, his honour, all the world approved. 
"We'll mourn till we too go as he has gone. 
And tread the dreary path to that dark world 
unknown. 



VERSES 

INTENDED TO BR WRITTEN EELOW A NOBLE EARL's 
PICTURE. 

WHOSE is that noble dauntless brow ? 
And whose that eye of fire ? 
And whose that generous princely mien 
Even rooted foes admire ? 

Stranger, to justly show that brow, 

And mark that eye of fire, 
"Would take His hand, whose vernal tlubg 

J (is other works inspire. 



266 VERSES ON CAPTAIN GROSE. 



Bright as a cloudless summer sun, 
With stately port he moves ; 

His guardian seraph eyes with awe 
The noble ward he loves. 

Among the illustrious Scottish sons 
That chief thou mayst discern ; 

Mark Scotia's fond returning eye — 
It dwells upon Glencairn. 



VERSES 

o?T CAPTAIN Grose's peregrinations through scot- 
land COLLECTING ANTIQUITIES OF THAT KINGDOM. 

HEAR, Land o' Cakes and brither Scots, 
Frae Maidenkirk to John o' Groats ; 
If there's a hole in a' your coats, 
I rede you tent it : 
A chiel's amang ye, takin' notes, 

And, faith, he'll prent it I 

If in your bounds ye chance to light 

Upon a fine, fat, fodgel wight, 

0' stature short, but genius bright, 

That's he, mark weel — 
And wow ! he has an unco slight 

0' cauk and keel. 

By some auld, houlet-haunted biggin, 
Or kirk deserted by its riggin*, 



VERSES ON CAPTAIN GROSE. 267 



It's ten to ane ye'll find him snug in 

Some eldritch part, 
Wi* dells, they say, Lord save's ! colleagiiin 

At some black art. 

Ilk ghaist that haunts auld ha' or chaumer, 

Ye gipsy gang that deal in glamour, 

And you, deep read in hell's black grammar, 

Warlocks and witches ; 
Ye'll quake at his conjuring hammer, 

Ye midnight bitches ! 

It's tauld he was a sodger bred, 
And ane wad rather fa'n than fled ; 
But now he's quat the spurtle-blade 

And dog-skin wallet, 
And ta'en the — antiquarian trade, 

I think they call it. 

He has a fouth 0' auld nick-nackets. 
Rusty airn caps and jinglin' jackets, 
Wad baud the Lothians three in tackets 

A townmond guid ; 
And parritch-pats, and auld saut-backets, 

Afore the flood. 

Of Eve's first fire he has a cinder ; 
Auld Tubal Cain's fire-shool and fender ; 
That which distinguished the gender 

0' Balaam's ass ; 
A broomstick o' the witch o* Endor, 

Weel shod wi' brass. 

Forbye, he'll shape you aff, fu' gleg. 
The cut of Adam's philabeg : 



268 VERSES ON A WOUNDED HARE. 



The knife that nicket Abel's craig 
He'll prove you fully, 

It was a faulding' jocteleg, 

Or lang-kail gully. 

But wad ye see him in his glee — 
For meikle glee and fun has he — 
Then set him down, and twa or three 

Guid fellows wi' him ; 
And port, port ! shine thou a wee, 

And then ye'll see him ! 

Now, b}^ the powers o* verse and prose t 
Thou art a dainty chiel, Grose ! 
Whae'er o' thee shall ill suppose, 

They sair misca' thee ; 
I'd take the rascal by the nose, 

Wad say, Shame fa' thee ! 



YKRSES 

ON SEEING A "WOUNDED HARE LIMP BY ME, W'HKJH A 
FELLOW HAD JUST SHOT. 

INHUMAN man ! curse on thy barb'rous art, 
And blasted be thy murder-aiming eye ; 
May never pity soothe thee with a sigh. 
Nor ever pleasure glad thy cruel heart ! 

Go live, poor wanderer of the wood and field ! 
The bitter little that of life remains : 
No more the thickening brakes and verdant plains 

Tu thee shall hoint?, or fuud, or pastime yield. 



TO THE SHADE OF THOMSON. 269 



Seek, mangled wretch, some place of wonted rest, 
No more of rest, but now thy dying bed ! 
The sheltering rushes whistling o'er thy head, 

The cold earth with thy bloody bosom prest. 

Oft as by winding Nith I, musing, wait 
The sober eve, or hail the cheerful dawn ; 
I'll miss thee sporting o'er the dewy lawn, 

And curse the ruffian's aim, and mourn thy hapless 
fate. 



ADDRESS TO THE SHADE OF THOMSON, 

ON GROWN I Na HIS BUST AT EDNAM, ROXBURGHSHIRE, 
WITH BATS. 

WHILE virgin Spring, by Eden's flood, 
Unfolds hoT tender mantle green, 
Or pranks the sod in frolic mood, 
Or tunes iEolian strains between : 

While Summer, with a matron grace, 
Retreats to Dry burgh's cooling shade, 

Yet oft, delighted, stops to trace 
The progress of the spiky blade : 

While Autumn, benefactor kind, 

By Tweed erects his agM head. 
And sees, with self-approving mind, 

Each creature on his bounty fed : 

While maniac Winter rages o'er 

The hills whence classic Yarrow flows, 

Rousing the turbid torrent's roar, 

Or sweeping, wild, a waste of snows ; — >. 



270 TO MISS CRUICKSHANK 



So long, sweet Poet of the year ! 

Shall bloom that wreath thou well hast won ; 
While Scotia, with exulting tear, 

Proclaims that Thomson was her son I 



TO MISS CRUIKSHANK, 

A VERY YOUNG LADY. WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAP 
OF A BOOK PRESENTED TO HER BY THE AUTHOR. 

BEAUTEUS rosebud, youni^ and gay, 
Blooming in the early May, 
Never mayst thou, lovely flower, 
Chilly shrink in sleety shower 1 
Never Boreas* hoary path. 
Never Eurus* poisonous breath, 
Never baleful stella lights, 
Taint thee with untimely blights I 
Never, never reptile thief 
Riot on thy virgin leaf ! 
Nor even Sol too fiercely view 
Thy bosom blushing still with dew ! 

Mayst thou long, sweet crimson gem, 
Richly deck thy native stem ; 
•Till some evening, sober, calm. 
Dropping dews, and breathing balm, 
While all around the woodland rings. 
And every bird thy requiem sings. 
Thou, amid the dirge ful sound. 
Shed thy dying honours round, 
And resign to parent earth 
The loveliest form she e'er gave birth. 



VERSES ON JOHN M'LEOD, ESQ. 271 



VERSES 

ON READING IN A NEWSPAPER THE DEATH OF JOHN 
M'LEOD, ESQ., BROTHER TO A YOUNG LADY, A 
PARTICULAR FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR'S. 

SAD thy tale, thou idle page, 
And rueful thy alarms : 
Death tears the brother of her love 
From Isabella's arms. 

Sweetly deckt with pearly dew 
The morning rose may blow ; 

But cold successive noontide blasts 
May lay its beauties low. 

Fair on Isabella's morn 

The sun propitious smiled ; 
But, long ere noon, succeeding clonds 

Succeeding hopes beguiled. 

Fate oft tears the bosom chords 

That Nature finest strung : 
So Isabella's heart was form'd, 

And so that heart was wrung. 

Were it in the poet's power, 
Strong as he shares the grief 

That pierces Isabella's heart, 
To give that heart relief 1 

Dread Omnipotence alone 

Can heal the wound He gave ; 

Can point the brimful grief- worn e.yos 
To scenes beyond the grave. 



272 PETITION OF BRUAR WATER. 



Virtue's blossoms there shall blow, 
And fear no withering bla^t ; 

There Isabella's spotless worth 
Shall happy be at last. 



THE HUMBLE PETITION OF BRUAR WATER 

TO THE NOBLE DUKE OF ATHOI-K. 

MY lord, I know your noble ear 
Woe ne'er assails in vain ; 
Embolden'd thus, I beg you'll hear 

Your humble slave complain, 
How saucy Phcebus' scorching beiirn.s, 

In flaming summer pride, 
Dry-withering, waste my foamy streamdj 
And drink my crystal tide. 

The lightly-jumpin', glowrin' troutM, 

That through my waters play. 
If, in their random, wanton spouts, 

They near the margin stray ; 
If, hapless chance ! they linger Jang, 

I'm scorching up so shallow, 
They're left, the whitening stanes ainaiig, 

In gasping death to wallow. 

Last day I grat wi' spite and teen, 

As Poet Burns came by, 
That to a bard I should be seen 

Wi' half my channel dry : 
A panegyric rhyme, I ween, 

Even as I was he shored me : 



PErrnON OF BRUAR WATER. 273 



But bad I in my glory been. 
He, kneeling, wad adored me. 

Here, foaming down the shelvy rocks, 

In twisting strength I rin ; 
There, high my boiling torrent smokes, 

Wild-roaring o'er a linn : 
Knjoying large each spring and well, 

As Nature gave them me, 
I am, although I say't mysel. 

Worth gaun a mile to see. 

Would, then, my noble master please 

To grant my highest wishes, 
He'll shade my banks wi' towering trees. 

And bonny, spreading bushes. 
Delighted doubly, then, my lord, 

You'll wander on my banks. 
And listen mony a grateful bird 

Return you tuneful thanks. 

The sober laverock, warbling wild. 

Shall to the skies aspire ; 
The gowdspink. Music's gayest child. 

Shall sweetly join the choir ; 
The blackbird strong, the lint white clear, 

The mavis mild and mellow ; 
The robin pensive autumn cheer, 

In all her locks of yellow. 

This, too, a covert shall insure, 
To shield them from the stor/ns ; 

And coward maukins sleep secure 
J_iOW in their grassy forms : 

^ S-s 



274 PE TITION OF BR UA R WA TER. 



The shepherd here shall make his seat, 
To weave his crown of flowers ; 

Or find a sheltering safe retreat, 
From prone-descending showers. 

And here, by sweet endearing stealth, 

Shall meet the loving pair, 
Despising worlds with all their wealth, 

As empty, idle care : 
The flowers shall vie in all their charms 

The hour of heaven to grace, 
The birks extend their fragrant arms 

To screen the dear embrace. 

Here haply too, at vernal dawn, 

Some musing bard may stray, 
And eye the smoking, dewy lawn, 

And misty mountain grey ; 
Or, by the reaper's nightly beam. 

Mild-chequering through the trees, 
Rave to my darkly-dashing stream. 

Hoarse swelling on the breeze. 

Let lofty firs, and ashes cool. 

My lowly banks o'erspread, 
And view, deep-bending in the pool. 

Their shadows' watery bed ! 
Let fragrant birks in woodbines drest 

My craggy cliffs adorn ; 
And, for the little songster's nest, 

The close embow'ring thorn. 

So may old Scotia's darling hope, 
Your little angel band, 



THE TWA HERDS. 275 \ 



Spring, like their fathers, up to prop 
Their honour' d native land ! 

So may through Albion's farthest ken, 
To social-flowing glasses, 

The grace be — " Athole's honest men, 
And Athole's bonnie lasses ! " 



THE TWA HERDS ; OR, THE HOLY TULZIE. 

OH, a' ye pious godly flocks, 
Weel fed on pastures orthodox, 
Wha now will keep you frae the fox, 

Or worrying tykes, 
Or wha will tent the waifs and crocks, 
About the dikes ? 

The twa best herds in a* the wast. 
That e'er gae gospel horn a blast, 
These flve-and-twenty simmers past, 

Oh, dooltotell! 
Hae had a bitter black outcast 

Atween themsel. 

Moodie, man, and wordy Russell, 

How could you raise so vile a bustle, 

Ye'll see how New- Light herds will whistle, 

And think it fine ! 
The Lord's cause ne'er gat sic a twistle 

Sin' I hae min*. 

Oh, sirs ! whae'er wad hae expeckit. 
Your duty ye wad sae negleckit, 



Ye wha were ne'er by lairds respeckit, 
To wear the plaid, 

But by the brutes themselves eleckit, 
To be their guide. 

What flock wi' Moodie's flock could rank^ 
Sae hale and hearty every shank ? 
Nae poison'd sour Arminian stank 

He let them taste ; 
Frae Calvin's well, aye clear, they drank 

Oh, sic a feast ! 

The thummart, wil'-cat, brock, and tod, 
Weel kenn'd his voice through a' the wood. 
He smelt their ilka hole and road, 

Baith out and in, 
And weel he liked to shed their bluid. 

And sell their skin. 

What herd like Russell tell'd his tale, 

His voice was heard through muir and dale, 

He kenn'd the Lord's sheep, ilka tail, 

O'er a' the height, 
And saw gin they were sick or hale, 

At the first sight. 

He fine a mangy sheep could scrub. 

Or nobly swing the gospel-club, 

And New-Light herds could nicely drub, 

Or pay their skin ; 
Could shake them owre the burning dub, 

Or heave them in. 

Sic twa— oh ! do I live to see't — 
Sic famous twa should disagreet, 



THE TWA HERDS. ^yj 



And names like '' villain," *' hypocrite," 

Ilk ither gi'en, 
While New-Light herds, wi' laughin' spite, 

Say neither's liein' ! 

A* ye wha tent the gospel fan Id, 

Tliere's Duncan, deep, and Peebles, shaul, 

But chiefly thou, apostle Auld, 

We trust in thee. 
That thou wilt work them, het and cauld, 

Till they agree. 

Consider, sirs, how we're beset, 
There's scarce a new herd that we get 
But comes frae 'mang that cursed set 

I winna name ; 
I hope frae heaven to see them yet 

In fiery flame. 

Dalrymple has been lang our fae, 
M'Gill has wrought us meikle wae, 
And that cursed rascal ca'd M'Quliae, 

And baith the Shaws, 
That aft hae made us black and blae, 

Wi' vengefu' paws. 

Auld Wodrow lang has hatch'd mischief, 
We thought aye death wad bring relief, 
But he has gotten, to our grief, 

Ane to succeed him, 
A chiel wha'll soundly buff" our beef ; 

I meikle dread him. 

And mony a ane that I could tell, 
Wha fain would openly rebel, 



278 ADDRESS TO THE TOOTHACHE, 



Forbye turn-coats amang oursel ; 

There's Smith for ane, 
I doubt he's but a grey-nick quill, 

And that ye'll fin'. 

Oh ! a* ye flocks o'er a' the hills, 

By mosses, meadows, moors, and fells, 

Come, join your counsel and your skills, 

To cowe the lairds, 
And get the brutes the powers themsels 

To choose their herds 

Then Orthodoxy yet may prance, 
And Learning in a woody dance. 
And that fell cur ca'd Common Sense, 

That bites sae sair, 
Be banish'd o'er the sea to France : 

Let him bark there. 

Til en Shaw's and D'rymple's eloquence, 
M'Gill's close nervous excellence, 
M'Quhae's pathetic manly sense, 

And guid M'Math, 
Wi* Smith, wha through the heart can glance, 

May a' pack aff. 



ADDRESS TO THE TOOTHACHE. 

WIUTTEN WHEN THE AUTHOR WAS GRIEVOUSLY 
TORMENTED BY THAT DISORDER, 

MY curse upon thy venom'd stang, 
That shoots my tortured gums alang ; 
And through my lugs gies mony a twang, 
Wi' gnawing vengeance ; 



ADDRESS TO THE TOOTHACHE, in 



Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang, 

Like wracking engines ! 

When fevers burn, and ague freezes, 
Klieumatics gnaw, or cholic squeezes ; 
Our neighbour's sympathy may ease us, 

Wi' pitying moan ; 
But thee — thou hell o' a* diseases, 

Aye mocks our groan ! 

Adown my beard the slavers trickle ! 
I kick the wee stools o'er the mickle, 
As round the fire the giglets keckle, 

To see me loup ; 
While, raving mad, I wish a heckle 

Were in their doup. 

or a' the numerous human dools, 

111 hairsts, daft bargains, cutty-stools, 

Or worthy friends raked i' the mools. 

Sad sight to see t 
The tricks o' knaves, or fash o' fools, 

Thou bear'st the gree^ 

Where'er that place be priests ca'd hell7"\ 
Whence a' the tones o' misery yell, \ 

And ranked plagues their numbers tell, ) 

In dreadfu' raw, / 

Thou, Toothache, surely bear'st the bell/ 

Amang them a' ! 

thou grim mischief-making chiel, 
That gars the notes of discord squeel, 
Till daft mankind aft dance a reel 

In gore a shoe thick, 
Gie a' the faes o* Scotland's weal 

A townmond's toothache ! 



ON THE BIRTH OF A POSTHUMOUS CHILD, 

BORN IN PECULIAR CIRCUMSTANCES OF FAMILY 
DISTRESS. 

SWEET flow' ret, pledge o' mciklc love, 
And ward o' niony a prayer, 
What heart o' stane would thou ua move, 
Sae helpless, sweet, and fair ! 

November liirples o'er the lea. 

Chill on thy lovely form ; 
And gane, alas ! the sheltering tree 

Should shield thee frae the storm. 

Iklay Ho who gives the rain to pour, 

And wings the blast to blaw, 
Protect thee frae the driving show'r, 

The bitter frost and snaw ! 

May He, the friend of woe and want, 
Who heal's life's various stounds, 

Protect and guard the mother plant, 
And heal her cruel wounds. 

But late she fiourish'd, rooted fast. 

Fair on the summer morn : 
Now, feebly bends she in the blast, 

Unshelter'd and forlorn. 

Blest be thy bloom, thou lovely gem, 

Unscathed by ruffian hand ! 
And from thee many a parent stem 

Arise to deck our land. 



LINES 

WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL, STANDING BY THE FALLS 
OF FYERS, NEAR LOOH NESS. 

AMONG the heathy hills and ragged woods 
The roaring Fyers pours his mossy tioodb ; 
Till full he dashes on the rocky mounds, 
Where, through a shapeless breach, his stream 

resounds, 
As high in air the bursting torrents flow, 
As deep-recoiling surges foam below, 
Prone down the rock the whitening sheet descendn, 
And viewless Echo's ear, astonish'd, rends. 
Dim seen, through rising mists and ceaseless showers, 
'J'he hoary caveruj wide-surrounding, lowers. 
Still, through the gap the struggling river toils, 
And still, below, the horrid cauldron boils. 



SECOND EPISTLE TO DAVIE, 

A BROTHER POET. 

AuLD Neibor, 

' 'M three times doubly o'er your debtor, 
For your auld-farrant, frien'ly letter; 
Though I maun say't, I doubt ye flatter, 

Ye speak sae fair, 
For my puir, silly, rhymin* clatter 
Some less maun sair. 



I 



ITalc be your heart, hale be your fiddle j 
Lang may your elbuck jink and diddle, 



282 SECOND EPISTLE TO DAVIE. 



To cheer you through the weary widdle 

0' war ly cares, 
Till bairns* bairns kindly cuddle 

Your auld grey hairs. 

But Davie, lad, I'm rede ye're glaikit ; 
1 111 tauld the Muse ye hae negleckit ; 
And gif it's sae, ye sud be licket 

Until ye fyke ; 
Sic hauns as you sud ne'er be faiket, 

Be haint wha like. 

For me, I'm on Parnassus* brink 

Rivin' the words to gar them clink ; 

Wliiles dais't wi' love, whiles dais't wi' drink, 

Wi' jads or masons ; 
And whiles, but aye owre late, I think 

Braw sober lessons. 

Of a' the thoughtless sons o' man, 
Commen' me to the bardie clan ; 
Except it be some idle plan 

0' rhymin' clink, 
The devil-haet that I sud ban, 

They ever think. 

Nae thought, nae view, nae scheme o' livin', 
Nae cares to gie us joy or grievin' ; 
But just the pouchie put the nieve in. 

And wliile ought's there, 
Then hiltie, skiltie, we gae scrievin*, 

And fash nae main 



THE HERMIT. 283 



l.ijczc iiiG on rliyme ! it's aye a treasure, 
]\1 y chief, ai^aist my only pleasure. 
At hame, a-fiel, at wark, or leisure, 

The Muse, poor hizzie ! 
Though rough and raplock be her measure, 

She's seldom lazy. 

Hand to the Muse, my dainty Davie : 
The warl' may play you mony a shavie ; 
But for the Muse, she'll never leave ye, 

Though e'er so puir, 
Na, even though limpin' wi' the spavie 

Frae door to door. 



THE HERMIT. 

\\ lliriEN ON A MARBLE SIDEBOARD IN THE HERMITAGE 
BELONGING TO THE DUKE OF ATHOLE, IN THE WOOD 
OF ABERFELDY, 

WHOE'ER thou art, these lines now reading,* 
Think not, though from the world receding, 
I joy my lonely days to lead in 

This desert drear ; 
That fell remorse, a conscience bleeding, 
Hath led me here. 

No thought of guilt my bosom sours — 
Free-will'd 1 fled from courtly bowers ; 
For well I saw in halls and towers 

That lust and pride, 
The arch -fiend's dearest, darkest powers, 

In state preside. 



284 ^^^ HERMIT. 



I saw mankind with vice encrusted ; 
I saw that Honour's sword was rusted ; 
That few for auojht but folly lusted ; 
That he was still deceived who trusted 

To love or friend ; 
And hither came, with men disgusted, 

My life to end. 

In this lone cave, in garments lowly, 

Alike a loe to noisy folly, 

And brow-bent gloomy melancholy, 

I wear awa}'^ 
My life, and in my office holy 

Consume the day. 

This rock my shield, when storms are blowing ; 
The limpid streamlet yonder flowing 
Supplying drink, the earth bestowing 

My simple food ; 
But few enjoy the calm I know in 

This desert wood. 

Content and comfort bless me more in 

This grot than e'er I felt before in 

A palace — and with thoughts still soaring 

To God on high. 
Each night and morn, with voice imploring, 

This wish I sigh : — 

** Let me, Lord ! from life retire, 
Unknown each guilty, worldly Are, 
Remorse's throb, or loose desire ; 

And when I die, 
Let me in this belief expire — 

To God I fly." 



stranger, if full of youth and riot, 
And yet no grief has marr'd thy quiet, 
Thou haply throw'st a scornful eye at 

The hermit's prayer ; 
But if thou hast good cause to sigh at 

Thy fault or care — 

If thou hast known false love's vexation, 
Or hast been exiled from thy nation, 
Or guilt affrights thy contemplation, 

And makes thee piuo — 
Oh ! how must thou lament thy station, 

And envy mine ! 



THE INVENTORY. 

ANSWER TO THE USUAL MANDATE SENT BY A 
SURVEYOR OF TAXES, REQUIRING A RETURN OF 
THE NUMBER OF HORSES, SERVANTS, ETC., KEPT. 

SIE., as your mandate did request, 
I send you here a faithfu' list 
0' guids and gear, and a' my graith, 
To which I'm clear to gie my aith. 

Imprimis, then, for carriage cattle, 
I hae four brutes o' gallant mettle, 
As ever drew afore a pettle ; 
My han'-afore's a guid auld has-heen, 
And wight and wilfu' a' his days been ; 
My han'-ahin's a weel-gaun filly, 
That aft has borne me hame frae Killie, 
And your auld boro* mony a time. 
In days when riding was nae crime— 



286 THE INVENTORY. 



But ance, whan in my wooing pride, 

I, like a blockhead, boost to ride, 

The wilfu' creature sae I pat to, 

(Lord, pardon a' my sins, and that too !) 

I play'd my filly sic a shavie, 

She's a* bedevil'd wi' the spavie. 

My fur-ahin's a worthy beast, 

As e'er in tug or tow was traced. 

The fourth's a Highland Donald hastie, 

A damn'd red-wud Kilburnie blastie I 

Forbye a cowte, o' cowte's the wale, 

As ever ran afore a tail : 

If he be spared to be a beast, 

He'll draw me fifteen pun' at least. 

Wheel-carriages I hae but few. 
Three carts, and twa are feckly new ; 
An auld wheelbarrow, mair for token, 
Ae leg and both the trams are broken ; 
I made a poker o' the spin'le. 
And my auld mither brunt the trin'le. 

For men, I've three mischievous boys, 
Run-deils for rantin' and for noise ; 
A gaudsman ane, a thrasher t'other, 
"Wee Davoc hands the nowte in fother. 
I rule them, as I ought, discreetly. 
And aften labour them completely ; 
And aye on Sundays duly, nightly, 
I on the question targe them tightly, 
Till, faith, wee Davoc's turned sae gleg, 
Though scarcely langer than my leg. 
He'll screed you aff* Effectual Calling 
As fast as ony in the dwalling: 



THE INVENTORY. 287 



I've nane in female seryan' station, 
(Lord, keep me aye frae a' temptation !) 
I hae nae wife, and that my bliss is, 
And ye hae laid nae tax on misses ; 
And then, if kirk folks dinna clutch me, 
I ken the devils darena touch me. 
Wi' weans I'm mair than weel contented, 
Heaven sent me ane mair than I wanted. 
My sonsie, smirking, dear-lought Bess, 
She stares her daddy in the face. 
Enough of ought ye like but grace ; 
But her, my bonnie, sweet, wee lady, 
I've paid enough for her already. 
And gin ye tax her or her mither, 
B' the Lord ! ye'se get them a' thegitlier, 

And now, remember, Mr. Aiken, 
Nae kind of license out I'm takin' ; 
Frae this time forth I do declare, 
I'se ne'er ride horse nor hizzie mair : 
Through dirt and dub for life I'll X'nidle, 
Ere I sae dear pay for a saddle ; 
My travel a' on foot I'll shank it, 
I've sturdy bearers, Gude be thankit ! 
The kirk and you may tak you that, 
It puts but little in your pat ; 
Sae dinna put me in your buke. 
Nor for my ten white shillings luke. 

This list wi* my ain hand I wrote it, 
The day and date as undernoted ; 
Then know ye all whom it concerns, 
Subscripsi huie, Robert Burns, 



288 THE WHISTLE. 



THE WHISTLE. 

I SING of a whistle, a whistle of worth, 
I sing of a whistle, the pride of the North, 
Was brought to the court of our good Scottish king, 
And long with this whistle all Scotland shall ring. 

Old Loda, still rueing the arm of Fingal, 
The god of the bottle sends down from his hall — 
"This whistle's your challenge — to Scotland get o'er, 
And drink them to hell, sir, or ne'er see me more t " 

Old poets have sung, and old chronicles tell, 
What champions ventured, what champions fell ; 
The son of great Loda was conquerer still. 
And blew on the whistle his requiem shrill. 

Till Robert, the lord of the Cairn and the Skai r, 
Unmatch'd at the bottle, unconquer'd in war, 
He drank his poor godship as deep as the sea, 
No tide of the Baltic e'er drunker than he. 

Thus Robert, victorious, the trophy has gain'd ; 
Which now in his house has for ages reraaiu'd ; 
Till three noble chieftains, and all of his blood, 
The jovial contest again have renew'd. 

Three joyous good fellows, with hearts clear of flaw : 
Oraigdarroch, so famous for wit, worth, and law ; 
And trusty Glen riddel, so skill'd in old coins ; 
And galknt Sir Robert, deep-read in old wines. 

Oraigdarroch began, with a tongue smooth as oil, 
Desiring Glenriddel to yield up the spoil ; 
Or else he would muster the heads of the clan; 
And once more, in claret, try whicli was the man. 



THE WHISTLE, 289 



" By the gods of the ancients 1 " Glenriddel replies, 
* ' Before I surrender so glorious a prize, 
I'll conjure the ghost of the great Rorie More, 
And bumper his horn with him twenty times o'er." 

Sir Robert, a soldier, no speech would pretend. 
But he ne'er turn'd his back on his foe — or his friend, 
Said, Toss down the whistle, the prize of the field, 
And, knee-deep in claret, he'd die ere he'd yield. 

To the board of Glenriddel our heroes repair. 

So noted for drowning of sorrow and care ; 

But for wine and for welcome not more known to fame 

Than the sense, wit, and taste of a sweet lovely dame. 

A bard was selected to witness the fray, 
And tell future ages the feats of the day ; 
A bard who detested all sadness and spleen, 
And wish'd that Parnassus a vineyard had been. 

The dinner being over, the claret they ply, 

And every new cork is a new spring of joy ; 

In the bands of old friendship and kindred so set, 

And the bands grew the tighter the more they were wet. 

Gay Pleasure ran riot as bumpers ran o'er ; 
Bright Phoebus ne'er witness'd so joyous a core, 
And vow'd that to leave them he was quite forlorn. 
Till Cynthia hinted he'd see them next morn. 

Six bottles apiece had well wore out the night, 
When gallant Sir Robert, to finish the fight, 
Turn'd o'er in one bumper a bottle of red, 
And swore 'twas the way that their ancestors did. 

T-t 



290 EPISTLE TO DR. BLACK LOCK. 



Then worthy Glenriddel, so cautious and sage, 
No longer the warfare, ungodly, would wage ; 
A high ruling-elder to wallow in wine ! 
He left the foul business to folks less divine. 

The gallant Sir Robert fought hard to the end ; 
But who can with Fate and quart-bumpers contend ? 
Though Fate said — A hero shall perish in light ; 
So up rose bright Phcebus — and down fell the knight. 

Next up rose our bard, like a prophet in drink : 
'* Craigdarroch, thou'U soar when creation shall sink ! 
But if thou wouldst flourish immortal in rhyme. 
Come — one bottle more — and have at the sublime ! 

**Thy line, that have struggled for Freedom with Bruce, 

Shall heroes and patriots ever produce : 

So thine be the laurel, and mine be the bay ; 

The field thou hast won, by yon bright god of day ! " 



EPISTLE TO DR. BLACKLOCK. 

WOW, but your letter made me vauntie ! 
And are ye hale, and weel, and cantie ? 
I kenn'd it still your wee bit jauntie 
Wad bring ye to : 
Lord send you aye as weel's I want ye, 
And then ye'll do. 

The ill-thief blaw the Heron south ! 
And never drink be near his drouth ! 



EPISTLE TO DR. BLACKLOCK. 291 



He tauld mysel, by word 0' raouth, 

He'd tak my letter ; 

I lippen'd to the chiel in trouth, 

And bade nae better. 

But aiblins honest Master Heron 
Had at the time some dainty fair one, 
To ware his theologic care on, 

And holy study ; 
And tired o' souls to waste his lear on, 

E'en tried the body. 

But what d'ye think, my trusty fier, 
I'm turn'd a ganger — Peace be here ! 
Parnassian queans, I fear, I fear, 

Ye'll now disdain me ! 
And then my fifty pounds a year 

Will little gain me. 

Ye glaikit, gleesome, daintj'- dammies, 
Wha, by Castalia's wimplin' streamies 
Loup, sing, and lave your pretty limbies, 

Ye ken, ye ken, 
That Strang necessity supreme is 

'Mang sons o' men. 

I hae a wife and twa wee laddies, 

They maun hae brose and brats o* duddies ; 

Ye ken yoursels my heart right proud is — 

I needna vaunt, 
But I'll sned besoms — thraw saugh woodies, 

Before they want. 

Lord, help me through this warld 0' care ! 
I'm weary sick o't late and air ! 



292 LINES ON FERGUS SON. 



Not but I liae a richer sliare 

Than mony ithers ; 

But why should ae man better fare, 

And a' men brithera ? 

Come, firm Resolve, take thou the van, 
Thou stalk o' carl-hemp in man ! 
And let us mind, faint heart ne'er wan 

A lady fair ; 
Wha does the utmost that he can, 

Will whiles do mair. 

But to conclude my silly rhyme 

(I'm scant o' verse, and scant o' time), 

To make a happy fireside clime 

To weans and wife ; 
That's the true patlios and sublime 

Of human life. 

My compliments to sister Beckie : 
And eke the same to honest Lucky, 
I wat she is a daintie chuckle, 

As e'er tread clay ! 
And gratefully, my ^uid auld cockie, 

I'm yours for aye, 

Robert Burns. 



LINES ON FERGUSSON. 

ILL-FATED genius ! Heaven-taught Fergusson ! 
"What heart that feels and will not yield a tear, 
To think life's sun did set ere well begun 
To shed its influence on thy bright career. 



PROLOGUE, 293 



Oh, why should truest worth and genius pine 
Beneath the iron grasp of Want and Woe, 

AVhile titled knaves and idiot greatness shine 
In all the splendour Fortune can bestow ! 



PROLOGUE, 

\ 

SrOKEN AT THE THEATRE, DUMFRIES, ON NEW-YEAR's \ 
DAY EVENING, 1790. j 

NO song nor dance I bring from yon great citj'" j 

That queens it o'er our taste — the more's the \ 

pity ; \ 

Though, by-the-by, abroad why will you roam ? \ 

Good sense and taste are natives here at home \ 

But not for panegyric I appear, ! 

I come to wish you all a good new year ! | 

Old Father Time deputes me here before ye, f 

Not for to preach, but tell his simple storj^ : j 

The sage grave ancient cough'd, and bade me say, i 

** You're one year older this important day." j 

If wiser, too — he hinted some suggestion, \ 

But 'twould be rude, you know, to ask the question ; i 

And with a would-be roguish leer and wink, \ 
He bade me on you press this one word — ** Think ! " 

Ye sprightly youths, quite jBush'd with hope and 
spirit. 
Who think to storm the world by dint of merit, 
To you the dotard has a deal to say, 
In his sly, dry, sententious, proverb way ; 
He bids you mind, amid your thoughtless raltlC; 
That the first blow is ever half the battle ; 



294 ELEGY ON MISS BURNET. 



I That though some by the skirt may try to snatch him, 

Yet by the forelock is the hold to catch him ; 
That whether doing, suffering, or forbearing, 
You may do miracles by persevering. 

Last, though not least in love, ye faithful fair, 
Angelic forms, high Heaven's peculiar care ! 
To you old Bald-pate smooths his wrinkled brow, 
And humbly begs you'll mind the important Nov/ ! 
To crown your happiness he asks your leave, 
And offers bliss to give and to receive. 

For our sincere, though haply weak, endeavours. 
With grateful pride we own your many favours ; 
And howsoe'er our tongues may ill reveal it, 
Believe our glowing bosoms truly feel it. 



ELEGY ON MISS BURNET OF MONBODDO. 

LIFE ne'er exulted in so rich a prize 
As Burnet, lovely from her native skies ; 
Nor envious Death so triumph'd in a blow, 
As that which laid th' accomplished Burnet low. 

Thy form and mind, sweet maid, can I forget ? 

In richest ore the brightest jewel set ! 

In thee, high Heaven above was truest shown. 

As by His noblest work the Godhead best is known. 

In vain ye flaunt in summer's pride, ye groves ; 

Thou crystal streamlet with thy flowery shore, 
Ye woodland choir that chant your idle loves, 

Ye cease to charm — Eliza is no more ! 



INVITATION TO A GENTLEMAN. 295 



Ye healthy wastes, inmix'd with reedy fens ; 

Ye mossy streams, with sedge and rushes stored ; 
Ye rugged cliffs, o'erhanging dreary glens, 

To you I fly, ye with my soul accord. 

Princes, whose cumbrous pride was all their worth, 
Shall venal lays their pompous exit hail ? 

And thou, sweet excellence ! forsake our earth, 
And not a Muse in honest grief bewail ? 

We saw thee shine in youth and beauty's pride, 

And virtue's light, that beams beyond the spheres ; 

But, like the sun eclipsed at morning tide. 
Thou left'st us darkling in a world of tears. 

The parent's heart that nestled fond in thee, 
That heart how sunk, a prey to grief and care ; 

So deckt the woodbine sweet yon aged tree ; 
So from it ravish'd, leaves it bleak and bare. 



INVITATION TO A MEDICAL GENTLEMAN 

TO A MASONIC ANNIVERSARY MEETING. 

FRIDAY first's the day appointed 
By our Right Worshipful appointed 
To hold our grand procession ; 
To get a blade o' Johnny's morals, 
And taste a swatch 0' Manson's barrels, 
r the way of our profession. 

Our Master and the Brotherhood 
Wad a* be glad to see you ; 



For me I would be mair than proud 
To share the mercies wi' you. 
If Death, then, wi* skaith, then, 
Some mortal heart is hechtin', 
Inform him, and storm him. 
That Saturday ye' 11 fecht him. 



LIKES 

ON MEETING WITH LOKI) T)A.J^R, 

THIS wot j'^e all whom it concerns, 
I, Rhymer Robin, alias Burns, 
October twenty-third, 
A ne'er-to-be-forgotten day ! 
Sae far I spraghled up the brae, 

I dinner'd wi' a lord. 

I've been at drucken writers' feasts, 
Nay, been bitch fou 'niang godly priests ; 

(Wi* rev'rence be it spoken !) 
I've even join'd the honour'd jorum, 
AVhen mighty squireships o' the quorum 

Their hydra drouth did sloken. 

But wi' a lord ! — stand out, my shin : 
A lord — a peer — an earl's son ! — 

Up higher yet, my bonnet 
And sic a lord ! — lang Scotch ells twa, 
Our peerage he o'erlooks them a'. 

As I look o'er my sonnet. 



LINES, 297 I 

f 

But, oil ! for Hogarth's magic power ! j 

To show Sir Bardie's willyart glower, ^ 

And how he stared and stammer'd ! 
When goavan, as if led wi' brauks, 
And stumpin' on his ploughman shanks, 

He in the parlour hammer'd. 

To meet good Stewart little pain is. 
Or Scotia's sacred Demosthenes ; 

Thinks I, they are but men ! 
But Burns, my lord — guid God ! I doited ! 
My knees on nne anither knoited. 

As faltering I gaed ben ! 

I sidling slielter'd in a nook, 
And at his lordship steal't a look, 

Like some pertentous omen ; 
Except good sense and social glee. 
And (what surprised me) modesty, 

I marked nought uncommon. 

I watch'd the symjitoms o' the great, 
The gentle pride, the lordly state, 

The arrogant assuming ; 
The fient a pride, nae pride had he, 
Nor sauce, nor slate, that I could see, 

Mair than an honest ploughman, 

Tlien from his lordship I shall learn 
Henceforth to meet with unconcern 

One rank as weel's another ; 
Nae honest, worthy man need care 
To meet wi' noble, youthful Daer, 

For he but meets a brother. 



298 THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN, 



THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN, 

AN OCCASIONAL ADDRESS SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE 
ON HEE, BENEFIT NIGHT. 

WHILE Europe's eye is fixed on mighty tilings, 
The fate of empires and the fall of kings ; 
AVhile quacks of state must each produce his plan, 
And even children lisp the Rights of Man ; 
Amid this mighty fuss, just let me mention, 
The Rights of Woman merit some attention. 

First, in the sexes* intermix'd connexion, 
One sacred right of woman is. Protection — 
The tender flower that lifts its head, elate, 
Helpless must fall before the blasts of Fate, 
Sunk on the earth, defaced its lovely form, 
Unless your shelter ward th' impending storm. 

Our second right — but needless here is caution, 
To keep that right inviolate's the fashion ; 
Each man of sense has it so full before him, 
He'd die before he'd wrong it — *tis Decorum. 
There was, indeed, in far less polish'd days, 
A time when rough, rude man had naughty ways ; 
Would swagger, swear, get drunk, kick up a riot, 
Nay, even thus invade a lady's quiet ! — 
Now, thank our stars ! those Gothic times are fled ; 
Now, well-bred men — and ye are all well bred ! — 
Most justly think (and we are much the gainers) 
Such conduct neither spirit, wit, nor manners. 

For right the third, our last, our best, our dearest, 
That right to fluttering female hearts the nearest, 



ADDRESS, 299 



Which even the rights of kings in low prostration 
Most humbly own — 'tis dear, dear Admiration ! 
In that blest sphere alone we live and move ; 
There taste that life of life — immortal love. 
Smiles, glances, sighs, tears, fits, flirtations, airs, 
'Gainst such a host what flinty savage dares ? — 
AVhen awful Seauty joins with all her charms, 
Who is so rash as rise in rebel arms ? 

But truce with kings, and truce with constitutions. 
With bloody armaments and revolutions ! 
Let majesty your first attention summon, 
Ah ! (^a ira ! The Majesty of Woman ! 



ADDRESS 

SPOKEN BY MTSS FONTENELLE ON HEE BENEFIT NIGHT. 

STILL anxious to secure your partial favour, 
And not less anxious, sure, this night than ever, 
A Prologue, Epilogue, or some such matter, 
'Twould vamp my bill, said I, if nothing better ; 
So sought a poet, roosted near the skies. 
Told him I came to feast my curious eyes ; 
Said nothing like his works was ever printed ; 
And last, my Prologue-business slily hinted. 
" Ma'am, let me tell you," quoth my man of rhymes, 
** I know your bent — these are no laughing times ; 
Can you — but, Miss, I own I have my fears — 
Dissolve in pause and sentimental tears ; 



300 ADDRESS, 



With laden sighs, and solemn-rounded sentence, 
Rouse from his sluggish slumbers fell Repentance ; 
Paint Yengeance, as he takes his horrid stand, 
"Waving on high the desolating brand, 
Calling the storms to bear him o'er a guiltj^ land ? " 

I could no more — a.skance the creature eyeing, 
D'ye think, said I, this face was made for crying ? 
I'll laugh, that's poz— nay, more, the world shall 

know it ; 
And so, your servant ! gloomy Master Poet ! 
Firm as my creed, sirs, 'tis my fixed belief 
That Misery's another word for Grief ; 
I also think — so may I be a bride ! 
That so much laughter, so much life enjoy'd. 

Thou man of crazy care and ceaseless sigh, 
Still under bleak Misfortune's blasting eye : 
Doom'd to that sorest task of man alive — 
To make three guineas do the work of five : 
Laugh in Misfortune's face — the beldam witch t 
Say you'll be merry, though you can't be rich. 
Thou other man of care, the wretch in love, 
Who long with jiltish arts and airs hast strove ; 
Who, as the boughs all temptingly project, 
Measur'st in des[)erate thought — a rope — thy neck — 
Or, where the beetling clitf o'erhangs the deep, 
Peerest to meditate the healing leap : 
Wouldst thou be cured, thou silly, moping elf, 
Laugh at her follies — laugh e'en at thyself : 
Learn to despise those irowns now so terrific. 
And love a kinder — that's your grand specific. 

To sum up all, be merry, I advise ; 
And as we're merry, may we still be wise. 



10 THE GUIDWIFE OF WAUCHOPE HOUSE. 



I 



GUIDWIFE, 

niiiul it weel, in early date, 
When I was beardless, young, and blate, 
And first could thrash the barn, 
Or baud a yokin' at the pleugh ; 
And though forfoughten sair enough, 

Yet unco proud to learn : 
When first amang the yellow corn 

A man I reckoned was, 
And Avi* the lave ilk roerry morn 
Could rank my rig and lass, 
Still shearing and clearing 
The tither stocked raw, 
Wi' clavers, and havers, 
Wearing the day awa'. 



Even then a wish (I mind its power), 
A wish that, to my latest hour, 

Shall strongly heave my breast — 
That I, for poor auld Scotland's sake. 
Some usefu' plan or beuk could malce, 

Or sing a sang at least, 
The rough burr-thistle, spreading wide 

Amang the bearded bear, 
I turn'd the weeder-clips aside, 
And spared the symbol dear : 
No nation, no station, 

My envy e'er could raise ; 
A Scot still, but blot still, 
I knew nae higher praise. 



302 GUIDWIFE OF WAUCHOPE. 



But still the elements o' sang, 

In formless jumble, right and wrang, 

"Wild floated in my brain ; 
Till on that hairs t I said before, 
My partner in the merry core, 

She roused the forming strain : 
I see her yet, the sonsie quean. 

That lighted up my jingle, 
Her witching smUe, her pauky een, 
That gart my heart strings tingle I 
I fired, inspired, 

At every kindling keek ; 
But bashiug, and dashing, 
I feared aye to speak. 

Health to the sex ! ilk guid chiel sayji, 
Wi' merry dance in winter-days. 
And we to share in common : 
The gust o' joy, the balm of woe, 
The saul o' life, the heaven below, 

Is rapture-giving woman. 
Ye surly sumphs, who hate the name, 

Be mindfu' o' your mither : 
She, honest woman, may think shame 
That ye're connected with her. 
Ye' re wae men, ye're nae men, 
That slight the lovely dears ; 
To shame ye, disclaim ye. 
Ilk honest birkie swears. 

For you, no bred to barn and byre, 
Wha sweetly tune the Scottish lyre, 
Thanks to you for your line : 



THIRD EPISTLE TO LAPRAIK. 303 



The marled plaid ye kindly spare 
By me should gratefully be ware ; 

'Twad please me to the Nine. 
I'd be mair vauntie o' my hap, 

Douce hingin' owre my curple, 
Than ony ermine ever lap, 
Or proud imperial purple. 
Fareweel then, lang heal then, 

And plenty be your fa* ; 
May losses and crosses 
Ne'er at your hallan ca' ! 



THIRD EPISTLE TO JOHN LAPRAIK. 

GUID speed and furder to you, Johnny, 
Quid health, hale ban's, and weather boiinie ; 
Now when ye're nickin* down fu' canny 

The staff o' bread, 
May ye ne'er want a stoup o' bran'y 
To clear your head. 

May Boreas never thrash your rigs, 
Nor kick your rickles a£f their legs, 
Sendin' the stuff o'er muirs and haggs 

Like drivin' wrack ; 
But may the tapmast grain that wags 

Come to the sack. 

I'm busy too, and skelpin' at it, 

But bitter, daudin' showers hae wat it, 

Sae my auld stumpie pen I gat it, 

Wi' muckle wark, 



And took my joctele^^ and wliatt it, 
Like ony dark. 

It's now twa month that Fm your debtor, 
For your braw, nameless, dateless letter, 
Abusin' me for harsh ill-nature 

On holy men, 
While deil a hair yoursel ye're better, 

But mair profane. 

But let the kirk-folk ring their bells, 
Let's sing about our noble sels ; 
We'll cry nae jads frae heathen hills 

To help or roose ns, 
But browster wives and whisky stills, 

They are the Muses. 

Your friendship, sir, I winna quat it, 

And if ye mak objections at it, 

Then han* in nieve some day we'll knot it, 

And witness take, 
And when wi' usquebae we've wat it. 

It winna break. 

But if the beast and branks be spared 
Till kye be gaun without the herd, ^ 

x\nd a' the vittel in the yard, 

And theekit right, 
I mean your ingle-side to guard 

Ae winter night. 

Then muse-inspirin' aqua-vitae 
Shall make us baith sae blithe and witty, 
Till ye forget ye're auld and gatty, 
And be as canty 



EPISTLE TO REV. /. M'MATH. 305 



As ye were nine year less than thretty, 

Sweet ane-and- twenty ! 

But stocks are cowpit wi' the blast, 
And now the sun keeks in the west, 
Then I maun rin amang the rest, 

And quat my chanter ; 
Sae I subscribe myself, in haste, 

Yours, Rab the Racstkk. 



EPISTLE TO THE REV. JOHN M'MATH. 

WHILE at the stook the shearers cow'r 
To shun the bitter, blaudin' show'r. 
Or in gulravage rinnin' scower 

To pass the time, 
To you I dedicate the hour 

In idle rhyme. 

My Musie, tired wi' mony a sonnet 

On gown, and ban', and douce black bonnet, 

Is grown right eerie now she's done it, 

Lest they should blame her. 
And rouse their holy thunder on it. 

And anathem her. 

I own 'twas rash, and rather hardy, 
That I, a simple, country bardie, 
Should meddle wi' a pack sae sturdy, 

Wha, if they ken me, 
Can easy, wi' a single wordie, 

Lowse hell upon me. 
Uu 



3o6 EPISTLE TO REV, /. M'MATH. 



Bat I gae mad at their grimaces, 

Their sighin', cantin', grace-proud faces, 

Their three-mile prayers, and half-mile graces, 

Their raxin' conscience, 
Whase greed, revenge, and pride disgraces 

Waur nor their nonsense. 

There's Gawn, misca't waur than a beast, 
Wha has mair honour in his breast 
Than mony scores as guid's the priest 

Wha sae abus't him ; 
And may a bard no crack his jest 

What way they've use't him ? 

See him, the poor man's friend in need, 
The gentleman in word and deed, 
And shall his fame and honour bleed 

By worthless skellums, 
And no a Muse erect her head 

To cowe the blellums ? 

O Pope, had I thy satire's darts. 
To gie the rascals their deserts, 
I'd rip their rotten, hollow liearts, 

And tell aloud 
Their jugglin', hocus-pocus arts. 

To cheat the crowd. 

God knows, I'm no the thing I should be, 
Kor am I even the thing I could be, 
But twenty times I rather would be 

An atheist clean, 
Than under gospel colours hid be, 

Just for a screen. 



EPISTLE TO REV. J. M'MATH, 307 



An honest man may like a glass, 
An honest man may like a lass, 
But mean revenge, and malice fause, 

He'll still disdain. 
And then cry zeal for gospel laws, 

Like some we ken. 

They take religion in their month ; 
They talk o' mercy, grace, and truth, 
For what ? — to gie their malice skouth 

On some pnir wight, 
And hunt him down, o'er right and ruth, 

To ruin straight. 

All hail, Religion ! maid divine ! 
Pardon a Muse sae mean as mine, 
Who, in her rough imperfect line, 

Thus daurs to name thee ; 
To stigmatise false friends of thine 

Can ne'er defame thee. 

Though blotcht and foul wi' mony a stain, 

And far unworthy of thy train, 

With trembling voice I tune my strain 

To join with those 
Who boldly daur thy cause maintain 

In spite 0' foes : 

In spile 0' crowds, in spite o' mobs, 
la spite o' undermining jobs, 
In spite 0' dark banditti stabs 

At worth and merit, 
By scoundrels, even wi' holy robes, 

But hellish spirit. 



3o8 EPISTLE TO GAVIN HAMILTON. 



O Ayr ! my dear, my native ground, 
Within thy presbyterial bound, 
A candid liberal band is found 

Of public teachers, 
As men, as Christians too, renown'd, 

And manly preachers. 

Sir, in that circle you are named ; 

Sir, in that circle you are famed ; 

And some, by wliom your doctrine's blamed 

(Which gies you honour), 
Even, sir, by them your heart's esteem'd, 

And winning manner. 

Pardon this freedom I have ta'eu, 
And if impertinent I've been, 
Impute it not, good sir, in ane 

Wliase heart ne'er wrang'd ye. 
But to his utmost would befriend 

Ought that belang'd ye. 



EPISTLE TO GAYIN HAMILTON, ESQ., 

RECOMMENDING A BOY. 

I HOLD it, sir, my bounden duty 
To warn you how that Master Tootie, 
Alias, Laird M^Gaun, 
Was here to hire yon lad away 
'Bout whom ye spak the tither day, 
And wad hae done't aff-han' ; 



EPISTLE TO GAVIN HAMILTON, 309 



But lest he learn the callan tricks, 
As, faith, I miickle doubt him, 
like scrapin' out auld Crummie's nicks, 
And tellin* lies about them ; 
As lieve then, I'd have then, 

Your clerkship he should sair, ^ 

If sae be ye may be \ 

Not fitted other where. \ 

Although I say't, he's gleg enough, 
And 'bout a house that's rude and rough 

The boy might learn to swear ; 
But then \vi' you he'll be sae taught, \ 

And get sic fair example straught, j 

I haena ony fear. \ 

Ye'll catechise him every quirk, 
And shore bim weel wi' hell ; 
And gar him follow to the kirk — 
Aye when ye gang yoursel. 
If ye then, maun be, then, 

Frae hame tliis comin' Friday, 
Then please, sir, to lea'e, sir, 
The orders wi' your lady. 

My word of honour I hae gien. 

In Paisley John's, that night at e'en, 

To meet the warld's worm ; 
To try to get the twa to gree, 
And name the airles and the fee, 

In legal mode and form : 
I ken he weel a sneck can draw, 

When simple bodies let him ; 
And if a devil be at a', 

In faith he's sure to get him. 



3IO EPISTLE TO MR, M'ADAM, 



To phrase you, and praise you, 
Ye ken your laureate scorns : 

The prayer still, you share still, 
Of grateful Minstrel Burns. 



EPISTLE TO MR. M'ADAM OF CRAIGETSIGILLAN. 

SIR, o'er a gill I gat your card, 
I trow it made me proud ; 
** See wha taks notice o' the bard ! " 
I lap and cried fu' loud. 

Now deil-rna-care about their jaw, 

The senseless, gawky million ; 
I'll cock m}'' nose aboon them a' — 

I'm roos'd by Craigengillan ! 

*Twas noble, sir ; 'twas like yoursel, 
To grant your high protection : 

A great man's smile, ye ken fu* well, 
Is aye a blest infection. 

Though by his banes wha in a tub 

Match'd Macedonian Sandy ! 
On my ain legs, through dirt and dub, 

I independent stand aye. 

And when those legs to guid w^arm kail 

Wi' welcome canna bear me, 
A lee dike-side, a sybow tail, 

And barley scone shall cheer me. 



Heaven spare you laiig to kiss the breath 

0* mony flowery simmers ! 
And bless your bonnie lasses baith — 

I'm tauld they're lo'esome kimmers ! 

And God bless young Dunaskin's laird, 

The blossom of our gentry ! 
And may he wear an auld man's beard, 

A credit to his country. 



TO CAPTAIN RIDDEL OF GLENRIDDEL. 

EXTEMPORE LINES ON EETURNING A NEWSPAPEK. 

YOUR news and review, sir, I've read through and 
through, sir, 
With little admiring or blaming ; 
The papers are barren of home news or foreign, 
No murders or rapes worth the naming. 

Our friends, the reviewers, those chippers and hewers, 

Are judges of mortar and stone, sir ; 
But of meet or unmeet, in a. fabric complete^ 

I boldly pronounce they are none, sir. 

My goose-quill too rude is to tell all your goodness 

Bestow'd on your servant, the poet ; 
Would to God I had one like a beam of the sun, 

And then all the world, sir, should know it ! 



312 VERSES TO JOHN MAXWELL, 



\ VERSES 

\ TO JOHN MAXWELL OF TERRAUGHTY, ON HIS BIRTHDAY, 

I TT EALTH to the Maxwells* veteran chief ! 

i JlX Health, aye unsour'd by care or grief : 

J Inspired, I turn'd Fate's sybil leaf 

I This natal morn ; j 

I see thy life is stuff o' prief, I 

Scarce quite half worn. I 

This day thou metes threescore eleven, 
I And I can tell that bounteous Heaven 

(The second sight, ye ken, is given 
To ilka poet) 

On thee a tack o\seven times seven 
\ Will yet bestow it. 

a 

\ If envious buckles view wi' sorrow 

Thy lengthen'd days on this blest morrow, 
May Desolation's lang-teeth'd harrow, 

Nine miles an hour, 
Rake them, like Sodom and Gomorrrah, 
In brunstane stoure ! 

But for thy friends, and they are mony, 
Baith honest men and lasses bonnie, 
May couthie Fortune, kind and canny, 

In social glee, 
Wi' mornings blithe and e'enings funny, 

Bless them and thee 1 

Fareweel, auld birkie ! Lord be near ye, 
And then the deil he daurna steer ye : 



THE VOWELS, 313 



Your friends aye love, your faes aye fear ye ; 

For me, shame fa' me, 
If neist my heart I dinna wear ye, 

While Burns they ca' me ! 



THE VOWELS : 



T 'np WAS where the birch and sounding thong are 

X plied, 
The noisy domicile of pedant pride ; 
W^here Ignorance her darkening vapour throws, 
And Cruelty directs the thickening blows ; 
Upon a time, Sir Abece the great, 
In all his pedagogic powers elate, 
His awful chair of state resolves to mount, 
And call the trembling Vowels to account- 
First enter'd A, a grave, broad, solemn wight, 
But, ah ! deform'd, dishonest to the sight ! 
His twisted head look'd backward on his way, 
And flagrant from the scourge, he grunted ai I 

Reluctant, E stalk'd in ; with piteous race 
The jostling tears ran down his honest face ! 
That name, that well-worn name, and all his own, 
Pale he surrenders at the tyrant's throne ! 
The pedant stifles keen the Roman sound 
Not all his raonorrel dipthongs can compound ; 
And next, the title following close behind, 
He to the nameless ghastly wretch assign'd. 



314 PROLOGUE. 



The cobweb'd Gothic dome resounded Y ! 

Ill sullen vengeance, I disdain'd reply : 

The pedant swung his felon cudgel round, 

And knock' d the groaning vowel to the ground ] 

In rueful apprehension enter'd 0, 

The wailing minstrel of despairing woe ; 

The inquisitor of Spain the most expert 

Might there have learnt new mysteries of his art : 

So grim, deform'd, with horrors entering, U 

His dearest friend and brother scarcely knew ! 

As trembling U stood staring all aghast, 
The pedant in his left hand cJutch'd him fast ; 
In helpless infants' tears he dipp'd his right, 
Baptised him ew, and kick'd him from his sight. 



PROLOGUE, 
FOB MR. Sutherland's benefit night, Dumfries. 

WHAT needs this din about the town o' Lon'on, 
How this new play and that new sang is comin' ? 
Why is outlandish stuff* sae meikle courted ? 
Does nonsense mend like whisky, when imported ? 
Is there nae poet, burning keen for fame, 
Will try to gie us sangs and plays at hame ? 
For comedy abroad he needna toil, 
A fool and knave are plants of every soil ; 
Nor need he hunt as far as Rome and Greece 
To gather matter for a serious piece ; 



PROLOGUE. 315 



There's themes enow iu Caledonian story, 
Would show the tragic Muse in a' her glory. 

Is there no daring bard will rise and tell 

How glorious Wallace stood, how hapless fell ? 

Where are the Muses fled that could produce 

A drama worthy o' the name o' Bruce ; 

How here, even here, he first unsheath'd the sword 

'Gainst mighty England and her guilty lord ; 

And after mony a bloody, deathless doing, 

Wrench'd his dear country from the jaws of ruin ? 

Oh for a Shakespeare or an Otway scene 

To draw the lovely, hapless Scottish queen ! 

Vain all the omnipotence of female cliarms 

'Gainst headlong, ruthless, mad Rebellion's arms. 

She fell, but fell with spirit truly Roman, 

To glut the vengeance of a rival woman : 

A woman — though the phrase may seem uncivil — 

As able and as cruel as the devil ! 

One Douglas lives in Home's immortal page, 

But Douglases were heroes every age : 

And though your fathers, prodigal of life, 

A Douglas followed to the martial strife, 

Perhaps if bowls row right, and Right succeeds, 

Ye yet may follow where a Douglas leads ! 

As ye hae generous done, if a' the land 
Would take the Muses' servants by the hand ; 
Not only hear, but patronise, befriend them, 
And where ye justly can commend, commend them ; 
And aiblins wlien they winua stand the test. 
Wink hard, and say the folks hae done their best ! 
Would a' the land do this, then I'll be caution 
Ye'll soon hae poets o' the Scottish nation, 



3i6 ELEGY ON THE YEAR 1788. 



Will gar Fame blaw until her trumpet crack, 
And warsle Time, and lay him on his back ! 

For us and for our stage should ony speir, 

** Wha's aught thae chiels maks a' this bustle here ? " 

My best leg foremost, I'll set up my brow, 

We have tVie honour to belong to you ! 

We're your ain bairns, e'en guide us as ye like, 

But, like good mithers, shore before ye strike. 

And gratefu' still I hope ye'll ever find us, 

For a' the patronage and meikle kindness 

We've got frae a' professions, sets, and ranks ; 

God help us ! we're but poor — ye'se get but thanks. 



ELEGY ON THE YEAR 1788. 

A SKETCH. 

FOR lords or kings I dinna mourn, 
E'en let them die — for that they're born ! 
But oh ! prodigious to reflec' ! 
A towraont, sirs, is gane to wreck ! 
Eighty-eight, in thy sma* space 
What dire events hae taken place ! 
Of what enjoyments thou hast reft us ! 
In what a pickle thou hast left us ! 

The Spanish empire's tint a head. 
And my auld teethless Bawtie's dead ; 
The tulzie's sair 'tween Pitt and Fox, 
And our guidwife's wee birdie cocks ; 
The tane is game, a bluidy devil, 
But to the hen birds unco civil ; 



The tither*s something dour o' treadin', 
But better stuff ne'er claw'd a midden. 

Ye ministers, come mount the pu'pit, 
And cry till ye be hoarse and roopit, 
For Eighty-eight he wish'd you weel, 
And gied you a' baith gear and meal ; 
E'en mony a plack, and mony a peck, 
Ye ken yoursels, for little feck ! 

Ye bonnie lasses, dight your een, 
For some o' you hae tint a frien' ; 
In Eighty-eight, ye ken, was ta*en 
What ye'll ne'er hae to gie again. 

Observe the very nowte and sheep, 
How dowf and dowie now they creep ; 
Nay, even the yirth itsel does cry, 
For Embrugh wells are grutten dry. 

Eighty-nine, thou's but a bairn, 

And no owre auld, I hope, to learn ! 

Thou beardless boy, I pray tak care. 

Thou now hast got thy daddy's chair, 

Nae hand-cuff 'd, muzzled, half-shackled regent, 

But, like himsel, a full, free agent. 

Be sure ye follow out the plan 

Nae waur than he did, honest man ! 

As muckle better as you can. 



31 8 ELEGY ON SIR J, H. BLAIR, 



DELIA.— AN ODE. 

FAIR the face of orient day, 
Fair the tints of opening rose ; 
But fairer still my Delia dawns, 
More lovely far her beaut}'' blows. 

Sweet the lark's wild- warbled lay, 
Sweet the tinkling rill to hear ; 
But, Delia, more delightful still, 
Steal thine accents on mine ear. 

The flower- enamoiir'd busy bee 
The rosy banquet loves to sip ; 
Sweet the streamlet's limpid lapse 
To the sun-brown'd Arab's lip. 

But, Delia, on thy balmy lips 
Let me, no vagrant insect, rove ! 
On, let me steal one liquid kiss ! 
For, oh ! my soul is parch'd with love ! 



ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF SIR JAMES 
HUNTER BLAIR. 

THE lamp of day, with ill-presaging glare. 
Dim, cloudy, sunk beneath the western wave ; 
The inconstant blast howl'd through the darkening air, 
And hollow whistled in the rocky cave. 

Lone as I wander'd by each cliff and dell, 
Once the loved haunts of Scotia's royal train ; 



ELEGY ON SIR J. H. BLAIR, 319 



Or mused where limpid streams, once hallow'd, well, 
Or mouldering ruins mark the sacred fane. 

The increasing blast roar'd round the beetling rocks, 
; The clouds, swift- wing'd, flew o'er the starry sky, 

i The groaning trees untimely shed their locks, 

And shooting meteors caught the startled eye. 

The paly moon rose in the livid east, 

And 'mong the cliffs disclosed a stately form, 

In weeds of woe, that frantic beat her breast. 
And mix'd her wailings with the raving storm. 

Wild to my heart the filial pulses glow, 

'Twas Caledonia's trophied shield I view'd : 

Her form majestic droop'd in pensive woe. 
The lightning of her eye in tears imbued. 

Reversed that spear, redoubtable in war, 
Reclined that banner, erst in fields unfurl'd, 

That like a deathful meteor gleam'd afar. 

And braved the mighty monarchs of the world. 

" My patriot son fills an untimely grave ! " 
With accents wild and lifted arms she cried ; 

" Low lies the hand that oft was stretch'd to save, 
Low lies the heart that swell'd with honest pride. 

** A weeping country joins a widow's tear, 
The helpless poor mix with the orphan's cry ; 

The drooping arts surround their patron's bier, 
And grateful science heaves the heartfelt sigli ! 

** I saw my sons resume their ancient fire ; 
1 saw fair Freedom's blossoms richly blow : 



320 THE POET'S WELCOME. 



But ah ! how hope is born but to expire I 
Relentless Fate has laid their guardian low. 

" My patriot falls, but shall he lie unsung, 
While empty greatness saves a worthless name ? 

No ; every Muse shall join her tuneful tongue, 
And future ages hear his growing fame. 

** And I will join a mother's tender cares, 
Through future times to make his virtues last ; 

That distant years may boast of other Blairs ! " 
She said, and vanish'd with the sleeping blast. 



THE POET'S WELCOME TO HIS ILLEGITIMATE 
CHILD. 

THOU'S welcome, wean ! mishanter fa me, 
If ought of thee, or of thy mammy, 
Shall ever danton me, or awe me. 

My sweet wee lady, 
Or if I blush when thou shalt ca' me 
Ti-ta or daddy. 

Wee image of my bonny Betty, 
I fatherly will kiss and daut thee. 
As dear and near my heart I set thee 

Wi' as guid will, 
As a' the priests had seen me get thee 

That's out o' hell. 

What though they ca* me fornicator, 
And tease my name in kintra clatter : 



EPISTLE TO JOHN GOUDIE. 321 



The mair they talk I'm kenn'd the hotter, 
E'en let them clash ! 

An auld wife's tongue's a feckless matter 
To gie ane fash. 

Sweet fruit 0' mony a merry dint, 

My funny toil is now a' tint, 

Sin thou came to the world asklent, 

AVhich fools may scoff at j 
In my last plack thy part's be in't — 

The better half o't 

And if thou be what I wad hae thee, 
And tak the counsel I shall gie thee, 
A lovin' father I'll be to thee, 

If thou be spared : 
Through a' thy childish years I'll e'e thee, 

And think't weel wared. 

Guid grant that thou may aye inherit 
Thy mither's person, grace, and merit, 
And thy poor worthless daddy's spirit, 

Without his failin's ; 
'Twill please me mair to hear and see't, 

Than stockit mailins. 



EPISTLE TO JOHN GOUDIE, KILMARNOCK, 

ON THE PUBLICATION OF HIS ESSAYS. 



O 



GOUDIE ! terror of the Whigs, 
Dread of black coats and reverend wigs, 



Sour Bigotry, on her last legs, 

Girnin', looks back, 
X-x 



322 EPISTLE TO JOHN GOUDIE. 



Wishin' the ten Eojyptiaii plagnes 
Wad seize you quick. 

Poor gapin', glowerin' Superstition, 
Waes me ! she's in a sad condition ; 
Fie ! bring Black Jock, her state physician, 

To see her water : 
Alas ! there's ground o' great suspicion 

She'll ne'er get better. 

Auld Orthodoxy long did grapple, 
But now she's got an unco ripple : 
Haste, gie her name up i' the chapel, 

Nigh unto death ; 
See how she fetches at the thrapple, 

And gasps for breath I 

Enthusiasm's past redemption, 

Gaen in a galloping consumption, 

Not a' the quacks, wi' a' their gumption, 

Will ever mend her. 
Her feeble pulse gies strong presumption 

Death soon will end her. 

'Tis you and Taylor are the chief 
Wha are to blame for this mischief; 
But gin the Ijord's ain folk gat leave, 

A toom tar-barrel 
And twa red peats wad send relief, 

And end the quarrel. 



EPISTLE TO JAMES TAIT 325 



EPISTLE TO JAMES TAIT OF GLENCONNER.. 

AULD comrade dear, and brither sinner, 
How's a' the folk about Glenconner ? 
How do ye this blae eastlin win'. 
That's like to blaw a body blin' ? 
For me, my faculties are frozen, 
My dearest member nearly dozen'. 
I've sent 5*ou here, by Johnnie Simson, 
Twa sage philosophers to glimpse on ! 
Smith, wi' his sympathetic feeling, 
And Reid, to common sense appealing. 
Philosophers have fought and wrangled, 
And meikle Greek and Latin mangled, 
Till wi' their logic-jargon tired. 
And in the depth of science mired, 
To common sense they now appeal, 
What wives and wabsters see and feel. 
But, hark ye, frien' ! I charge you strictly, 
Peruse them, and return them quickly, 
For now I'm grown sae cursed douce 
I pray and ponder butt the house ; 
My shins, my lane, I there sit roastin', 
Perusing Bunyan, Brown, and Boston ; 
Till by-and-by, if I baud on, 
I'll grunt a real gospel-groan : 
Already I begin to try it, 
To cast my e'en up like a pyet, 
When by the gun she tumbles o'er, 
Fluttering and gasping in her gore : 
Sae shortly you shall see me bright, 
A burning and a shining light. 

My heart-warm love to guid auld Glen, 
The ace and wale of honest men ; 



When bending down wi' auld grey hairs, 
Beneath the load of years and cares, 
May He who made him still support him, 
And views beyond the grave comfort him. 
His worthy family, far and near, 
God bless them a' wi* grace and gear ! 

My auld school-fellow, preacher Willie, 
The manly tar, my Mason Billie, 
And Auchenbay, I wish him joy ; 
If he's a parent, lass or boy, 
May he be dad, and Meg the mither, 
Just five-and-forty years thegither ! 
And no forgetting Wabster Charlie, 
I'm tauld he offers very fairly. 
And, Lord, remember Singing Sannock, 
Wi' hale-breeks, saxpence, and a bannock. 
And next my auld acquaintance, Nancy, 
Since she is fitted to her fancy ; 
And her kind stars hae airted till her 
A good chiel wi' a pickle siller. 
My kindest, best respects I sen' it. 
To cousin Kate and sister Janet ; 
Tell them, frae me, wi' chiels be cautious, 
For, faith, they'll aiblins fin' them fashions ; 
To grant a heart is fairly civil, 
But to grant a maidenhead's the devil. 
And lastly, Jamie, for 5^oursel, 
May guardian angels tak a spell, 
And steer you seven miles south o' hell : 
But first, before you see heaven's glory, 
May ye get mony a merry story, 
Mony a laugh, and mony a drink. 
And aye eneugh o' needfu* clink. 



FROM E SOP US TO MARIA, 325 



Now fare ye weel, and joy be wi' you ; 
For my sake this I beg it o* you, 
Assist poor Simson a* ye can, 
Ye'll find him just an honest man : 
Sae I conclude, and quat my chanter. 
Yours, saint or sinner, 

Rob the Ranter. 



EPISTLE FROM ESOPUS TO MARIA. 

FRO^r those drear solitudes and frowsy cells, 
Where Infamy with sad Repentance dwells ; 
Where turnkeys make the jealous mortal fast, 
And deal from iron hands the spare repast ; 
Where truant 'prentices, yet young in sin, 
Blush at the curious stranger peeping in ; 
Where strumpets, relics of the drunken roar. 
Resolve to drink, nay, half to whore, no more ; 
Where tiny thieves, not destined yet to swing, 
Beat hemp for others riper for the string : 
From these dire scenes my wretched lines I date, 
To tell Maria her Esopus' fate. 

** Alas ! I feel I am no actor here ! " 
'Tis real hangmen real scourges bear ! 
Prepare, Maria, for a horrid tale 
Will turn thy very rouge to deadly pale ; 
Will make thy hair, though erst from gipsy poU'd, 
By barber woven, and by barber sold, 
Though twisted smooth with Harry's nicest care, 
Like hoary bristles to erect and stare. 



326 FROM ESOPUS TO MARIA. 



The hero of the mimic scene, no more 

I start in Hamlet, in Othello roar ; 

Or hauojhty chieftain, *mi(l the din of arms, 

In Highland bonnet woo Malvina's charms ; 

Whilst sans-culottes stoop up the mountain high, 

And steal from me Maria's prying eye. 

Blest Highland bonnet ! once my proudest dress, 

Now prouder still, Maria's temples press. 

I see her wave thy towering plumes afar, 

And call each coxcomb to the wordy war; 

I see her face tlie first of Ireland's sons. 

And even out-Irish his Hibernian bronze ; 

The crafty colonel leaves the tartan'd lines, 

For other wars, where he a hero shines ; 

The hopeful youth, in Scottish senate bred, 

Who owns a Bushby's heart without the head ; 

Comes, 'mid a string of coxcombs, to dicsplay 

That veni, vidiy vici is his way ; 

The shrinking bard adown aa alley skulks. 

And drearls a meeting worse than Woolwich hulks : 

Though there, his heresies in church and state 

Might well award him Muir and Palmer's fate : 

Still she undaunted reels and rattles on, 

And dares the public like a noontide sun. 

(What scandal call'd Maria's jaunty stagger 

The ricket reeling of a crooked swagger ; 

Whose spleen e'en worse than Burns's venom when 

He dips in gall unmix'd his eager pen — 

And pours his vengeance in the burning line, 

Who christen'd thus Maria's lyre divine ; 

The idiot strum of vanity bemused, 

And even the abuse of poesy abused ; 

Who call'd her verse a parish workhouse, made 

For motley, foundling fancies, stolen or stray' d ?) 



r- 



FROM E SOP US TO MARIA, 327 



A workhouse ! ha, that sound awakes my woes, 
And pillows on the thorn my rack'd repose ! 
In durance vile here must I wake and weep, 
And all my frowsy couch in sorrow steep ! 
That straw where many a rogue has lain of yore, 
And vermin'd gipsies litter'd heretofore. 

Why, Lonsdale, thus thy wrath on vagrants pour, 
Must earth no rascal save thyself endure ? 
Must thou alone in guilt immortal swell, 
And make a vast monopoly of hell ? 
Thou know'st the virtues cannot hate thee worse ; 
The vices also, must tliey club their curse? 
Or must no tiny sin to others fall, 
Because thy guilt's supreme enough for all % 

Maria, send me too thy griefs and cares ; 
In all of these sure thy Esopus shares. 
As thou at all mankind the flag unfurls. 
Who on my fair one satire's vengeance hurls ? 
Who calls thee pert, affected, vain coquette, 
A wit in folly, and a fool in wit ? 
Who says that fool alone is not thy due. 
And quotes thy treacheries to prove it true ? 
Our force united on thy foes we'll turn, 
And dare the war with all of woman born : 
For who can write and speak as thou and I ? 
My periods, that deciphering defy. 
And thy still matchless tongue, that conquers all 
reply. 



\ 328 THE FAREWELL, 


THE FAREWELL. 

? TTAREWELL, old Scotia's bleak domains, 
1 X"^ Far dearer than the torrid plains 


! Where rich ananas blow ! 


■' Farewell, a mother's blessing dear ! 


A brother's sigh ! a sister's tear ! 
My Jean's heart-rendincr throe ! 
Farewell, my Bess ! though thou'rt bereft 


Of my parental care ; 


A faitiiful brother I have left, 


My part in him thou'lt share ! 


Adieu too, to you too. 


My Smith, my bosom frien' ; 
When kindly you mind me, 


Oh, then befriend my Jean ! 


What bursting anguish tears my heart t 


From thee, my Jeanie, must I part 1 


Thou, weeping, answerest, * * No ! " 


Alas ! misfortune stares my face, 


And points to ruin and disgrace ; 


I, for thy sake, must go ! 


Thee, Hamilton and Aiken dear, 


A grateful, warm adieu ! 


I, with a much-indebted tear, 


Shall still remember you ! 


All hail then, the gale then. 


Wafts me from thee, dear shore ! 


It rustles and whistles — 


I'll never see thee more 1 





EPISTLE TO B, GRAHAM, ESQ. 329 



EPISTLE TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ. OF FINTRY, 

ON THE CLOSE OF THE DISPUTED ELECTION BETWEEK 
SIR JAMES JOHNSTON AND CAPTAIN MILLER, FOR 
I'HE DUMFRIES DISTRICT OF BOROUGHS. 

FINTRY, my stay in worldly strife. 
Friend o' my Muse, friend o' my life, 
Are ye as idle's I am ? 
Come then, wi' nn couth, kintra fleg, 
O'er Pegasus I'll Hiu^ my leg, 

And ye shall see me try hira. 

ril sing the zeal Drunilanrig bears, 
Wha left the all-important cares 

Of princes and their darlin's ; 
And, bent on winning borough touns, 
Came shaking hands wi' wabster louns, 

And kissing barefit carlins. 

Combustion through our boroughs rode, 
Whistling his roaring pack abroad. 

Of mad, unmuzzled lions ; 
As Queensberry ** buff and blue " unfmTd, 
And Westerha* and Hopetoun hurl'd 

To every Whig defiance. 

But cautious Queensberry left the war, 
The unmanner'd dust might soil his star ; 

Besides, he hated bleeding : 
But left behind him heroes bright, 
Heroes in Caesarean fight, 

Or Ciceronian pleading. 



330 EPISTLE TO R, GRAHAM, ESQ. 



Oh, for a throat like huge Moiis-Meg, 
To muster o'er each ardent Whig 

Beneath Drumlanrig's banners ; 
Heroes and lieroines commix, 
All in the held of politics, 

To win immortal honours. 

M'Murdo and his lovely spouse 

(Th* enamour'd laurels kiss her brows !) 

Led on the Loves and Graces : 
She won eacli gaping burgess' heart, 
While he, all-couqueriKg, play'd his part 

Amang their wives and lasses. 

Craigdarroch led a light-arm'd corps ; 
Tropes, metaphors, and figures pour, 

Like Hecla streaming thunder : 
Glenriddel, skill'd in rusty coins, 
Blew up each Tory's dark designs, 

And bared the treason under. 

In either wing two champions fought, 
Redoubted Staig, who set at nought 

The wildest savage Tory : 
And Welsh, who ne'er yet flinch'd his ground, 
High- waved his magnum-bonura round 

With Cyclopean fury. 

Miller brought up the artillery ranks, 
The many-pounders of the Banks, 

Resistless desolation ! 
While Maxwelton, that baron bold, 
Mid Lawson's port entrench'd his hold, 

And threaten'd worse damnation. 



EPISTLE TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ, 33 t 



To these, what Tory hosts opposed ; 
With these, what Tory warriors closed, 

Surpasses my discriving : 
Squadrons extended long and large, 
With furious speed rush'd to the charge, 

Like raging devils driving. 

What verse can sing, what prose narrate, 
The butcher deeds of bloody Fate 

Amid this mighty tulzie ! 
Grim Horror grinn'd— pale Terror roar*d 
As Murther at his thrapple shored, 

And Hell mix'd in the brulzie ! 

As Highland crags by thunder cleft, 
When lightnings fire the stormy lift. 

Hurl down wi* crashing rattle : 
As Hames amang a hundred woods ; 
As headlong foam a hundred floods ; 

Such is the rage of battle I 

The stubborn Tories dare to die ; 
As soon the rooted oaks would fly 

Before th* approaching fellers : 
The Whigs come on like Ocean's roar, 
When all his wintry billows pour 

Against the Buchan Bullers. 

Lo, from the shades of Death's deep night, 
Departed Whigs enjoy the fight, 

And think on former daring : 
The muffled murtherer of Charles 
The Magna-Charta flag unfurls, 

All deadly gules its bearing. 



Nor wanting ghosts of Tory fame, 

Bold Scrimgeour follows gallant Orahame, 

Auld Covenanters shiver. 
(Forgive, forgive, mnch-wrong'd Montrose ! 
While death and hell engulf thy foes, 

Thou liv'st on high for ever !) 

Still o'er the field the combat burns, 
The Tories, Whigs, give way by turns ; 

But Fate the word has spoken ; 
For woman's wit and strength o* man, 
Alas ! can do but what they can — 

The Tory ranks are broken I 

Oh, that my een were flowing burns ! 
My voice a lioness that mourns 

Her darling cub's undoing ! 
That I might greet, that I might cry, 
While Tories fall, while Tories fly, 

And furious Whigs pursuing ! 

What Whig but wails the good Sir James ! 
Dear to his country by the names 

Friend, patron, benefactor ! 
Not Pulteney's wealth can Pulteney save ! 
And Hopetoun falls, the generous brave ! 

And Stewart, bold as Hector. 

Thou, Pitt, shalt rue this overthrow ; 
And Thurlow growl a curse of woe : 

And Melville melt in wailing ! 
Now Fox and Sheridan rejoice ! 
And Burke shall sing, ** Prince, arise ! 

Thy power is all-prevailing." 



EPISTLE TO MAJOR LOGAN. 333 \ 



For your poor friend, the bard, afar 
He hears, and only hears, the war, 

A cool spectator purely ! 
So when the storm the forest rends, 
The robin in the hedge descends, 

And sober chirps securely. 

Additional verse in Closeburn MS. — 
[ 

Now for my friends' and brethren's sakes, 
And for my dear-loved Land 0' Cakes, 

I pray with holy fire : 
Lord, send a rough-shod troop o' hell, 
O'er a' wad Scotland buy or sell, 

To grind them in the mire I 



EPISTLE TO MAJOR LOGAN. 

HAIL, thairm-inspirin', rattlin' Willie ! 
Though Fortune's road be rough and l.ill\ 
To every fiddling, rhyming billie, 

We never heed, 
But tak it like the unback'd filly, 
Proud o' her speed. 

When idly goavan whiles we saunter, 

Yirr Fancy barks, awa' we canter. 

Up hill, down brae, till some mischanter. 

Some black bog-hole. 
Arrests us, then the scaith and banter 

We're forced to thole. 



334 EPISTLE TO MAJOR LOGAN, 



Hale be your heart ! hale be your fiddle ! 
Long may your elbuck jink and diddle, 
To cheer you through the weary widdle 

0' this wild warl', 
Until you on a cummock driddle 

A grey-hair'd carl. 

Come wealth, come poortith, late or soon, 
Heaven send your heart-strings aye in tune, 
And screw your temper-pins aboon, 

A fifth or mair. 
The melancholious, lazy croon 

O' cankrie care. 

May still your life from day to day 
Nae Unit largo in the play, 
But alUgrctto forte gay 

Harmonious flow ; 
A sweeping, kindling, bauld strathspey — 

Encore ! Bravo ! 

A blessing on the cheery gang 
Wha dearly like a jig or sang. 
And never think o' right and wrang 

By square and rule. 
But as the clegs o' feeling stang 

Are wise or fool ! 

My hand- waled curse keep hard in chase 
The harpy, hoodock, purse-proud race, 
Wha count on poortith as disgrace — 

Their tuneless hearts I 
May fireside discords jar a base 

To a* their parts ! 



EPISTLE TO MAJOR LOGAN, 335 



But come, your hand, my careless brither, 
r th' ither warl' — if there's anither, 
And that there is I've little swither 

About the matter— 
We cheek for chow shall jog thegither, 

I'se ne'er bid better. 

WeVe faults and failings— granted clearly, 
We're frail backsliding mortals merely, 
Eve's bonnie squad, priests wyte them sheerly 

For our grand fa' ; 
But still, but still, I like them dearly — 

God bless them a' ! 

Ochon ! for poor Castalian drinkers, 
When they fa' foul o' earthly jinkers, 
The witching, curs'd, delicious blinkers 

Hae put me hyte, 
And gart me weet my waukrite winkers, 

Wi' girnin' spite. 

But by yon moon ! — and that's high sweariri' - 
And every star within my hearin' ! 
And by her een wha was a dear ane I 

I'll ne'er forget ; 
I hope to gie the jads a clearin' 

In fairplay yet. 

My loss I mourn, but not repent it, 
I'll seek my pursie whare I tint it, 
Ance to the Indies I were wonted, 

Some cantrip hour. 
By some sweet elf I'll yet be dinted, 

Then, Vive V amour I 



336 ADDRESS OF BEELZEBUB, 



Fait^ mes haisscinaim respectueuses. 

To sentimental sister Susie, 

And honest Lucky ; no to roose ye, 

Ye may be proud, 
That sic a couple Fate allows ye 

To grace your blood. 

Nae mair at present can I measure, 

And trouth my rhymin' ware's nae treasure ; 

But when in Ayr, some half-hour's leisure, 

Be't light, be't dark. 
Sir Bard will do hirasel' the pleasure 

To call at Park. 

Robert Bfbns. 



ADDRESS OF BEELZEBUB 

10 THE PRESIDENT OF THE HIGHLAND SOCIETY. 

LONG life, my Lord, and health be yours, 
Unscaith'd by hunger'd Highland boors ; 
Lord grant nae duddie desperate beggar, 
Wi' dirk, claymore, or rusty trigger, 
May twin auld Scotland o' a life 
She likes — as lambkins like a knife. 

Faith, you and A s were right 

To keep the Highland hounds in sight ; 
I doubt na ! they wad bid nae better 
Than let them ance out owre the water ; 
Then up amang thae lakes and seas 
They'll mak what rules and laws they please ; 
Some daring Hancock, or a Franklin, 
May set their Highland bluid a-ranklin' : 



ADDRESS OF BEELZEBUB, '},yj 



Some Washington again may head them, 

Or some Montgomery fearless lead them, 

Till God knows what may be effected, 

When by such heads and hearts direntect- 

Poor dunghill sons of dirt and mire 

May to patrician rights aspire ! 

Nae sage North now, nor sager Sackville, 

To watch and premier o'er tlie pack vile ; 

And whare will ye get Howes and Clintons 

To bring them to a right repentance, 

To CO we the rebel generation, 

And save the honour o' the nation ? 

They and be damu'd ! what right hae they 

To meat or sleep, or light o' day ? 

Far less to riches, power, or freedom, 

But what your Lordship likes to gie them ? 

But hear, my Lord ! Glengarry, hear ! 
Your hand's owre light on them, I fear ; 
Your factors, grieves, trustees, and bailies, 
I canna say but they do gaylies ; 
They lay aside a' tender mercies. 
And tirl the hallions to the birses ; 
Yet while they're only poind 't and herriet, 
They'll keep their stubborn Highland spirit ; 
But smash them ! crash them a' to spails ! 
And rot the dy vors i* the jails ! 
The young dogs, swinge them to the labour ; 
Let wark and hunger mak them sober ! 
The hizzies, if they're aughtlins fawsout, 
Let them in Drury Lane be lesson'd ! 
And if the wives and dirty brats 
E'en thigger at your doors and yetts, 
Flaffan wi' duds and grey wi' beas', 
Y-y 



338 EPISTLE TO HUGH PARKER, 



Frightin' awa' your deucks and geese, 
Get out a horsewhip or a jovvler, 
The langest thong, the fiercest growler, 
And gar the tatter'd gypsies pack . 
Wi' a' their bastarts on their back ! 
Go on, my Lord ! I lang to meet you, 
And in my house at hame to greet you ; 
Wi' common lords ye shanna mingle, 
The benmost neuk beside the insfle, 
At my right han' assigned your seat, 
'Tween Herod's hip and Polycrate— 
Or if you on your station tarrow, 
Between Almagro and Pizarro, 
A seat, I'm sure ye' re weel deservin't ; 
And till ye come — Your humble servant, 

Beelzebub. 



EPISTLE TO HUGH PARKER. 

IN this strange land, this uncouth clime, 
A land unknown to prose or rhyme ; 
Where words ne'er crost the Muse's heckles, 
Nor limpet in poetic shackles ; 
A land that Prose did never view it, 
Except when drunk he stachert through it ; 
Here, ambush'd by the chimla cheek, 
Hid in an atmosphere of reek, 
I hear a wheel thrum i' the neuk, 
I hear it — for in vain I leuk. 
The red peat gleams, a fiery kernel, 
Enhusk^d by a fog infernal ; 



EPISTLE TO HUGH PARKER, 339 



Here, for my wonted rhyming raptures, 

I sit and count my sins by chapters ; 

For life and spunk, like ither Christians, 

I'm dwindled down to mere existence, 

Wi' nae converse but Gallowa* bodies, 

Wi' nae kenn'd face but Jenny Geddes. 

Jenny, my Pegasean pride ! 

Dowie she saunters down Nithside, 

And aye a westlin leuk she throws, 

While tears hap o'er her auld brown nose ! 

Was it for this, wi' canny care, 

Thou bure the bard through many a shire ? 

At howes or hillocks never stumbled. 

And late or early never grumbled ? 

Oh, had I power like inclination, 

I'd heeze thee up a constellation, 

To canter with the Sagitarre, 

Or loup the ecliptic like a bar ; 

Or turn the pole like any arrow ; 

Or, when auld Phoebus bids good-morrow, 

Down the zodiac urge the race, 

And cast dirt on his godship's face : 

For I could lay my bread and kail, 

He'd ne'er cast saut upo' thy tail. 

Wi' a' this care and a' this grief, 

And sma', sma' prospect of relief. 

And nought but peat-reek i' my head, 

How can I write what ye can read ? — 

Tarbolton, twenty-fourth o' Juno, 

Ye'll find me in a better tune ; 

But till we meet and weet our whistle, 

Tak this excuse for nae epistle. 

Robert Burns. 



340 POETICAL mVITATION. 



POETICAL INYITATIOK TO MR. J. KENNEDY. 

NOYT, Kennedy, if foot or horse 
E'er bring you in by Mauchline Ortrse, 
Lord, man, there's lasses there wad force 

A hermit's fancy ; 
And down the gate, in faith, they're worse, 
And mair mi chancy. 

But, as I'm savin', please step to Dow's, 
And taste sic gear as Johnnie brews, 
Till some bit callant bring me news 

That you are there ; 
And if we dinna hand a bouze 

Fse ne'er drink mair. 

It's no I like to sit and swallow, 
Then like a swine to puke and wallow ; 
But gie me just a true good fallow, 

Wi' right inginc, 
And spunkie, ance to make us mellow, 

And then we'll .«?hiue. 

Now, if ye're ane o' warld's folk, 
Wha rate the wearer by the cloak, 
And sklent on poverty their joke, 

"NVi' bitter sneer, 
Wi* you no friendship will I troke. 

Nor cheap nor dear, 

l^ut if, as I'm informed weel. 
Ye hate, as ill's the very deil. 
The flinty heart that canna feel — 

Come, sir, liero's tae you I 
Hae, there's my hauu', I wiss you weel, 

And guid be wi' you. 



ELEG Y ON ROBERT DUNDAS. 34 1 

ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT DUNDAR, 
ESQ. OF ARNISTON, 

LA'L'E LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COURT OF SESSION. 

LONE on the bleaky hills the strayiug flocks 
Shun the tierce storms among the sheltering rocks ; 
Down foam the rivulets, red with dashing rains ; 
The gathering Hoods burst o'er the distant plains ; 
Beneath the blast tlie leafless forests groan ; 
The hollow caves return a sullen moan. 

Ye hills, ye plains, ye forests, and ye caves, 
Ye howling winds, and wintry-swelling waves ! 
Unheard, unseen, by human ear or eye, 
Sad to your sympatlietic scenes I fly ; 
Where, to the whistling blast and waters' roar. 
Pale Scotia's recent wound I may deplore. 

Oh heavy loss, thy country ill could bear ! 

A loss these evil days can ne'er repair ! 

Justice, the high vicegerent of her God, 

Her doubtful balance eyed, and swayed her rod ; 

She heard the tidings of the fatal blow, 

And sunk, abandon'd to the wildest woe. 

Wrongs, injuries, from many a darksome den, 
Now gay in hope explore the paths of men : 
See, from his cavern, grim Oppression rise, 
And throw on Poverty his cruel eyes ; 
Keen on the helpless victim see him fly, 
And stifle, dark, the feebly-bursting cry. 

Mark rufliau Violence, distain'd with crimes, 
Rousing elate in these degenerate times ; 



342 THE KIRKS ALARM. 



View unsuspecting Innocence a prey, 

As gfuileful Fraud points out the erring way : 

While subtle litigation's pliant tongue 

The life-blood equal sucks of Right and Wrong : 

Hark ! injured Want recounts th' unlistened tale, 

And much-wrong'd Misery pours the unpitied wail ! 

Ye dark waste hills, and brown unsightly plains, 
To you I sing \ny grief-inspired strains : 
Ye tempests, rage ! ye turbid torrents, roll ! 
Ye suit the joyless tenor of my soul. 
Life's social haunts and pleasures I resign, 
Be nameless wilds and lonely wanderings mine, 
To mourn the woes my country must endure, 
That wound degenerate ages cannot cure. 



THE KIRK'S ALARM. 

A SATIRE. 

ORTHODOX, orthodox, 
Wha believe in John Knox, 
Let me sound an alarm to your conscience — ■ 
There's a heretic blast 
Has been blawn i' the wast, 
That what is not sense must be nonsense. 

Doctor Mac, Doctor Mac, 

You should stretch on a rack, 
To strike evil-doers wi' terror ; 

To join faith and sense, 

Upon ony pretence, 
Is heretic, damnable error. 



THE KIRK'S ALARM, 343 



Town of Ayr, town of Ayr, 

It was mad, I declare, 
To meddle wi' mischief a-brevving ; 

Provost John is still deaf 

To the Church's relief, 
And Orator Bob is its ruin. 

D'rymple mild, D'rymple mild. 
Though your heart's like a child, 

And your life like the new-driven snaw ; 
Yet that winna save yo, 
Auld Satan must have ye, 

For preaching that three's ane and twa. 

Rumble John, Rumble John, 
Mount the steps wi' a groan, 

Cry the book is wi' heresy cramm'd ; 
Then lug out your ladle. 
Deal brimstone like adle. 

And roar every note of the damn'd. 

Simper James, Simper James, 
Leave the fair Killie dames, 

There's a holier chase in your view ; 
I'll lay on your head 
That the pack ye' 11 soon lead, 

For puppies like you there's but few, 

Siuget Sawney, Singet Sawney, 

Are ye herding the penny, 
Unconscious what evil awaits % 

Wi' a jump, yell, and howl, 

Alarm every soul. 
For the foul thief is just at your gates. 



344 THE KIRK'S ALARM. 



Daddy Auld, Daddy Auld, 

There's a tod in the fauld, 
A tod rneikle waur than the clerk ; 

Though ye dowua do skaith, 

Ye'U be in at the death, 
And if ye canna bite, ye can bark. 

Davie Bluster, Davie Bluster, 

For a saunt if ye muster, 
The corps is no nice of recruits ; 

Yet to worth let's be just, 

Royal blood ye might boast, 
If the ass were the king of the brutes. 

Jamie Goose, Jamie Goose, 

Ye hae made but toom roose, 
In hunting the wicked lieutenant ; 

But the doctor's your mark, 

For the Lord's haly ark 
He has cooper'd and ca'd a wrang pin iii't. 

Poet Willie, Poet Willie, 

Gie the Doctor a volley, 
Wi' your ** Liberty's chain" and your wit ; 

O'er Pegasus' side 

Ye ne'er laid a stride, 
Ye but smelt, man, the place where he— 

Andro Gouk, Andro Gouk, 

Ye may slander the book, 
And the book nane the waur, let me tell ye 

Though ye' re rich, and look big, 

Yet lay by hat and wig, 
And ye'll hae a calfs head o' sma' value. 



THE KIRK'S ALARM, 345 



Ban* Steenie, Barr Steenie, 

What mean ye, what mean ye ? 
If ye*ll meddle nae mair wi' the matter, 

Ye may hae some pretence 

To havins and sense, 
V\'i' people wha ken ye nae better. 

Irvine side, Irvine side, 

Wi* your turkey-cock pride, 
Of manhood but sraa' is your share ; 

Ye've the figure, 'tis true, 

Even your faes will allow, 
And your friends they daur grant ye nae myir. 

Muirlaud Jock, Muirland Jock, 

When the Lord makes a rock. 
To crush Common Sense for her sins, 

If ill manners were wit. 

There's no mortal so fit 
To confound the poor Doctor at ance. 

Holy Will, Holy Will, 

There was wit i* your skull 
When ye pilfer'd the alms 0' the poor ; 

The timmer is scant, 

When ye' re ta'en for a saunt, 
Wha should swing in a rape for an hour. 

Calvin's sons, Calvin's sons, 

Seize your spiritual guns, 
Ammunition you never can need ; 

Your hearts are the stuflf 

Will be powther enough, 
And your skulls are storehouses 0' lead. 



346 WILLIE CHALMERS, 



Poet Burns, Poet Buids, 

Wi' your priest-skelping turns, 

Why desert ye your auld Dative shire, 
Your Muse is a gips}^ — 
E'en though she were tipsy, 

She coukl ca' us nae waur than we are. 



WILLIE CHALMERS. 

Madam — 

Wr braw new branks, in mickle pride, 
And eke a braw new brechan, 
My Pegasus I'm got astride, 
And up Parnassus pechin ; 
Whiles owre a bash, wi' downward crush, 

The doited beastie stammers ; 

Then up he gets, and off he sets, 

For sake o' Willie Chalmers. 

I doubt na, lass, that weel-kenn'd name 

May cost a pair o' blushes ; 
I am nae stranger to your tame, 

Nor his warm-urged wishes. 
Your bounie face, sae mild and sweet, 

His honest heart enamours, 
Aud, faith, ye'U no be lost a whit, 

Though waired on Willie Chalmers. 

Auld Truth hersel might swear ye're fair, 
And Honour safely back her, 

And Modesty assume your air, 
And ne'er a ane mistak' her ; 



— . > 

i 

WILLIE CHALMERS. 347 I 



And sic twa love-inspiring een 
Might lire even holy palmers ; 

Nae wonder, then, they've fatal been 
To honest Willie Chalmers. 

I doubt na Fortune may you shore 

Some mim-mou'd pouther'd priestie, 
Fu' lifted up wi* Hebrew lore, 

And baud upon his breastie : 
But oh ! what signifies to you 

His lexicons and grammars : 
The feeling heart's the royal blue, 

And that's wi' Willie Chalmers. 

Some gapin', glowrin' country laird 

May warsle for your favour ; 
May claw his lug, and straik his beard, 

And hoast up some palaver. 
My bonnie maid, before ye wed 

Sic clumsy-witted hammers, 
Seek Heaven for help, and barelit skelp 

Awa* wi' Willie Chalmers. 

Forgive the bard ! my fond regard 

For ane that shares my bosom 
Inspires my Muse to gie'm his dues, 

For deil a hair I roose him. 
May powers aboon unite you soon. 

And fructify your amours — 
And every year come in mair dear 

To you and Willie Chalmers. 



348 REMORSE. 



ELEGY OK PEG KICHOLSON. 

PEG Nicholson was a good bay mare 
As ever trod on airn ; 
But now she's floating down the Nith, 

And past the mouth o' Cairn. 
Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare, 
And rode through thick and thin ; 
But now she's floating down the Nith, 
And wanting even the skin. 

Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare, 

And ance she bore a priest ; 
But now she's floating down the Nith, 

For Solway fish a feast 
Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare, 

And the priest he rode her sair ; 
And much oppress'd and braised she was, 

As priest-rid cattle are. 



REMORSE. 

A FEAGMBNT. 

OF all the numerous ills that hurt our peace, 
That press the soul, or wring the mind with 
anguish, 
Beyond comparison, the worst are those 
That to our folly or our guilt we owe. 
In every other circumstance, the mind 
Has this to say—" It was no deed of mine ; " 



RUINS OF LINCLUDEN ABBEY. 349 



But when, to all the evil of misfortune, 
This sting is added — " Blame thy foolish self 1 " 
Or, worser far, the pangs of keen remorse — 
The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt — 
Of guilt, perhaps, where we've involved others, 
The young, the innocent, who fondly lov'd us ; 
JSTay, more — that very love their cause of ruin ! 
burning hell ! in all thy store of torments, 
There's not a keener lash ! 
Lives there a man so firm, who, while his heart 
Feels all the bitter horrors of his crime, 
Can reason down its agonising throbs ; 
And, after proper purpose of amendment, 
Can firmly force his jarring thoughts to peace ? 
Oh, happy, happy, enviable man ! 
Oh, glorious magnanimity of soul I 



VERSES 

ON AN EVENING VIEW OF THE RUINS OF LINCLUDEN 
ABBEY. 

YE holy walls, that, still sublime, 
Resist the crumbling touch of Time ; 
How strongly still your form displays 
The piety of ancient days ! 
As through your ruins, hoar and grey — 
Ruins yet beauteous in decay — 
The silvery moonbeams trembling fly, 
The forms of ages long gone by 
Crowd thick on Fancy's wondering eye, 
And wake the soul to musings high. 



350 RUINS OF LINCLUDEN ABBEY, 



Even now, as lost in thought profound, 
I view the solemn scene around, 
And, pensive, gaze with wistful eyes, 
The past returns, the present flies ; 
Again the dome, in pristine pride, 
Lifts high its roof and arches wide. 
That, knit with curious tracery, 
Each Gothic ornament display ; 
The high-arch'd windows, painted fair, 
Show many a saint and martyr there. 
As on their slender forms I gaze, 
Methinks they brighten to a blaze ! 
With noiseless step and taper bright, 
What are yon forms that meet my sight ? 
Slowly they move, while every eye 
Is heavenward raised in ecstasy : 
'Tis the fair, spotless, vestal train, 
That seek in prayer the midnight fane. 
And, hark ! what more than mortal sound 
Of music breeds the pile around ? 
'Tis the soft-chanted choral song, 
Whose tones the echoing aisles prolong : 
Till, 'thence return'd, they softly stray 
O'er Cluden's wave, with fond delay ; 
Now on the rising gale swell high, 
And now in fainting murmurs die : 
The boatmen on Nith's gentle stream, 
That glistens in the pale moon's beam, 
Suspend their dashing oars to hear 
The holy anthem, loud and clear ; 
Each worldly thought a while forbear, 
And mutter forth a half-form'd prayer. 
But, as I gaze, the vision fails, 
Like frost-work touch'd by southern galea ; 



TO THE OWL, 351 



The altar sinks, the tapers fade, 
And all the splendid scene's decay'd. 
In window fair the painted pane 
No longer glows with holy stain, 
But, through the broken glass, the gale 
Blows chill3'' from the misty vale. 
The bird of eve flits sullen by, 
Her home, these aisles and arches high : 
The choral hymn, that erst so clear 
Broke softly sweet on Fancy's ear, 
Is drown'd amid the mournful scream, 
That breaks the magic of my dream : 
Roused by the sound, I start and see 
The ruin'd, sad reality ! 



TO THE OWL.* 

SAD bird of night, what sorrow calls thee forth. 
To vent thy plaints thus in the midnight hour 
Is it some blast that gathers in the north, 
Threat'ning to nip the verdure of thy bower ? 

Is it, sad owl, that Autumn strips the shade. 
And leaves thee here, unshelter'd and forlorn ? 

Or fear that Winter will th}^ nest invade ? 
Or friendless Melancholy bids thee mourn ? 

Shut out, lone bird, from all the feather'd train, 
To tell thy sorrows to th' unheeding gloom ; 

No friend to pity when thou dost complain, 
Grief all thy thought, and solitude thy home. 

Sing on, sad mourner I I will bless thy strain, 
And pleased in sorrow listen to thy song : 



352 TRA GIC FRA GHENT. 



Sing on, sad mourner ! to the night complain, 
While the lone echo wafts thy notes along. 

Is beauty less, when down the glowing cheek 
Sad, piteous tears in native sorrows fall ? 

Less kind the heart when Anguish bids it break ? 
Less happy he who lists to Pity's call % 

Ah no, sad owl ! nor is thy voice less sweet, 
That Sadness tunes it, and that Grief is there ; 

That Spring's gay notes, unskill'd, thou canst repeat ; 
That Sorrow bids thee to the gloom repair. 

Nor that the treble songsters of the day 
Are quite estranged, sad bird of night 1 from tliee : 

Nor that the thrush deserts the evening spray, 
When darkness calls thee from thy reverie. 

From some old tower, thy melancholy dome, 
While the grey walls and desert solitudes 

Return each note, responsive to the gloom 
Of ivied coverts and surrounding woods ; 

There hooting, I will list more pleased to thee 

Than ever lover to the nightingale ; 
Or drooping wretch, oppress' d with misery, 

Lending his ear to some condoling tale. 



TRAGIC FRAGMENT. 

ALL devil as I am, a damnM wretch, 
A harden'd, stubborn, unrepenting villain, 
Still my heart melts at human wretchedness ; 
And with sincere, though unavailing sighs 



I view the helpless children of distress. 

With tears indignant I behold the oppressor 

Rejoicing in the honest man's destruction, 

Whose unsubmitting heart was all his crime. 

Even you, ye helpless crew, I pity you ; 

Ye, whom the seeming good think sin to pity ; 

Ye poor, despis'd, abandon'd vagabonds, 

Whom Vice, as usual, has turn'd o'er to Ruin. 

— Oh, but for kind, though ill-requited friends, 

I had been driven forth like you, forlorn, 

The most detested, worthless wretch among you ! 

injured God ! Thy goodness has endow'd mo 

With talents passing most of my compeers, 

Which I in just proportion have abused 

As far surpassing other common villains. 

As Thou in natural parts hadst given me more. 



PROLOGUE, 

SPOKEN BY MR. WOODS ON HIS BENEFIT NIGHT, 
MONDAY, APRIL 16, 1787. 

WHEN by a generous public's kind acclaim. 
That dearest meed is granted — honest fame ; 
When here your favour is the actor's lot, 
Nor even the man in private life forgot ; 
What breast so dead to heavenly virtue's glow. 
But heaves impassion'd with the grateful throe ? 

Poor is the task to please a barbarous throng, 
It needs no Siddons' powers in Southern's song : 
But here an ancient nation, famed afar 
For genius, learning high, as great in war — 
Z-z 



I 354 PROLOGUE. 

i 

j Hail, Caledonia ! name for ever dear ! 

I Before whose sons I'm honour'd to appear ! 

i Where every science — every nobler art — 

I That can inform the mind, or mend the heart, 

I Is known ; as grateful nations oft have found, 

I Far as the rude barbarian marks the bound. 

Philosophy, no idle, pedant dream, 
; Here holds her search by heaven- taught Reason's beam ; 

\ Here History paints, with elegance and force, 

I The tide of Empire's fluctuating course ; 

' Here Douglas forms wild Shakespeare into plan, 

^ And Harley rouses all the god in man. 

- When well-form'd taste and sparkling wit unite 

I With manly lore, or female beauty bright 

i (Beauty, where faultless symmetry and grace, 

;' Can only charm us in the second place), 

j Witness my heart, how oft with panting fear, 

As on this night, I've met these judges here I 
But still the hope Experience taught to live, 
Equal to judge — you're candid to forgive. 
No hundred-headed Riot here we meet, 
AVith decency and law beneath his feet, 
Nor Insolence assumes fair Freedom's name ; 
Like Caledonians, you applaud or blame. 

Thou, dread Power ! whose empire-giving hand 
Has oft been stretch'd to shield the honour'd land ! 
Strong may she glow with all her ancient fire ! 
May every son be worthy of his sire ! 
Firm may she rise with generous disdain 
At Tyranny's, or direr Pleasure's, chain ; 
Still self-dependent in her native shore. 
Bold may she brave grim Danger's loudest roar, 
Till Fate tlie curtain drops on worlds to be no more ! 



ADAM A 'S PRA YER. 35 5 



ADAM A 'S PRAYER. 

GUDE pity me, because I'm little, 
For though I am an elf o' mettle, 
And can, like ony wabster's shuttle, 

Jink there or here ; 
Yet, scarce as lang's a guid kail whittle, 
I'm unco queer. 

And now thou kens our woefu' case. 
For Geordie's jurr we're in disgrace. 
Because we've stang'd her through the place. 

And hurt her spleu«han, 
For which we daurna show our face 
Within the clachan. 

And now we're dern'd in glens and hollows, 
And himted, as was William Wallace, 
Wi' constables, those blackguard fellows. 

And sodgers baith ; 
But gude preserve us frae the gallows, 

That shamefu' death ! 

Auld, grim, black-bearded Geordie's sel, 
Oh, shake him o'er the mouth o' hell, 
There let him hing, and roar, and yell, 

Wi' hideous din, 
And if he offers to rebel, 

Just heave him in. 

When Death comes in, wi' glimmering blink, 
And tips auld drunken Nanse the wink, 
May Hornie gie her doup a clink 

Ahint his yett. 
And fill her up wi' brimstone drink, 

Red, reeking, het. 

There's Jockie and the haveril Jenny, 
Some devils seize them in a hurry. 



356 ELEGY ON ROBERT RUISSEAUX, 



And waflf them in the infernal wherry 

Straught through the lake, 

And gie their hides a noble cnrry, 
VV i' oil of aik. 

As for the jurr, poor worthless body, 
She's got mischief enough already ; 
\Vi' stanged hips, and buttocks bhiiily, 

She's suffered vsair ; 
But may she wintle in a woodie 

If she whore mair. 



N^ 



ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT RUISSEAUX. j 

fOW Robin lies in his last lair, J 

He'll gabble rhyme nor sing nae mair, j 

Cauld poverty, wi' hungry stare, 5 

Nae mair shall fear him ; 

Nor anxious fear, nor cankert care, , 

E'er mair come near him. 

To tell the truth, they seldom fasht him, 
Except the moment that they crush t him : 
For sune as chance or fate had husht 'em, 

Though e'er sae short, 
Then wi' a rhyme or song he lasht 'em. 

And thought it sport. 

Though he was bred to kintra wark. 
And counted was baith wight and stark. 
Yet that was never Robin's mark 

To mak a man ; 
But tell him, he was learn'd and dark, 

Ye loosed him than ! 



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